The Vivienne Files

Capsule wardrobes inspired by art and nature

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Travel with Janice Archives - Page 7 of 16

Paris Graffiti and Street Art, April 2016

You might not fully appreciate my love of good graffiti, but I walk a LOT in Chicago, and never get to see anything nearly this witty or just plain well-executed. The graffiti in Chicago is that same tired, self-aggrandizing and incomprehensible "tagging" that's some variation of initials or names, written large, and badly...Okay, this guy was NOT graffiti, but I think someone sitting outdoors, playing a harp, qualifies as street art of the very finest quality!

 

Some of the graffiti is just small pieces on a wall (sometimes quite HIGH on a wall); and sometimes, you see a bike driving out of the building. Very Harry Potter-ish...

The first image was seen quite a bit, and was apparently part of the sponsorship project for the ... View the Post

What Women were Wearing in Paris, April 2016

April 13, 2016  

Well okay, not what everyone was wearing, but what caught my eye...

Belovedest OF COURSE knows what I'm doing when I'm looking at people in Paris, and he's turned out to be an invaluable partner in spying patterns and noticing the garments that seem to be worn by 10% of the people we see.

First up - grey jeans! We couldn't tell if these were black jeans that were well faded, or if they were jeans that were grey by design. At any rate, we saw them often, and generally they weren't skin-tight. We saw virtually nothing cropped, but quite a few jeans were rolled neatly at the ankles, exposing jazzy socks...

 

And let's put an old rule to bed for at least a while... For years, we were all given ... View the Post

The Highlights of Our Paris Vacation

Yes, honestly, I looked down at our feet, and the wee heart-shaped pebble was right there between our toes... It was that kind of vacation!

It really was one of the best trips ever - everything fell into place for us to a degree that's almost impossible to describe. We had 20 minutes of rain (during which we stood under an awning and discussed the rest of our day), we ate like crazy people, discovered some new (to us) cocktails, did some excellent shopping, and walked about 10 miles every day. Despite the mad amounts of eating and drinking that we did, I lost weight...

The first highlight - we got to see the Paris Marathon. As runners (well, in my case, as a fast walker/runner), seeing the elite runners at the head of the ... View the Post

How I Pack for Paris in a Carry-on Bag

Remember, my bag is a hard-sided Tumi carry-on, very much like the great-grandmother of this beauty:

    My bag is pretty "whacked" on the exterior, but remains in very secure, solid condition! One of my better investments, I have to say...     One of the things about rolling bags that makes packing difficult is that the interior bottom of the bag is bumpy - the bars for the handle run through the bag and make the "floor" of your packing area bumpy. So the first thing I always try to do is use unwrinkleable things, like workout clothes, to level the floor.   Here, I've taken running tights, rolled them into long cylinders (fold in half at the knee, and then roll a few times), and then placed a pair of ... View the Post

How to Pack a Travel Capsule Wardrobe for Paris – the “Three Dresses” Version

March 30, 2016  

Belovedest and I are going BACK to Paris on Friday! Yes, I was just there in December...And I'm going to try the strangest variation on packing yet - since we're only there for 6 nights, and since I always fly back from Paris in the same outfit I wear for the flight over (with a change of tee shirt), I'm just packing three dresses, which will cover the 5 full days that we're there. Two pair of ballet flats, and a stack of scarves.... This is going to be interesting!

I'm sticking pretty close to my uniform for packing - tee shirt, cardigan, scarf, and pants that won't collapse after 8 hours of sitting. This cardigan is going to be really handy on this trip, as I can wear it over all 3 dresses, depending on the ... View the Post

Six BIG Trends to Try (Maybe) for Spring!!!!

March 21, 2016

These lists always crack me up, but I think they're worth considering, from time to time. I see two sides of this issue:

I hate this, because I don't think you should listen to what someone tells you to wear unless you're in an organization for which a uniform is appropriate, or if you're in a wedding.... but It can be edifying to see what other people think of as "can't miss" because it can clue you into things that are going to be readily available in stores for a while, and maybe remind you that it's time to replace or upgrade something that you haven't purchased in years.

Yes, my name is Janice (like Janus, the god of beginnings, endings, doorways, portals, and both sides of everything). The '90s ... View the Post

Paris 2015: Food, My Hotel, and more about What They Were Wearing

December 22, 2015   First up: food!!!  

I personally find it pretty difficult to eat badly in Paris; if you go someplace where you only understand a fraction of what's going on, and where there are lots of people from the neighborhood, the food is bound to be at least acceptable.My last day, I was wandering pretty aimlessly near the Marais, and I spotted a nice looking restaurant, so I decided (since it was nearing 1 p.m., and I was peckish), to stop in for lunch. The formule (set price menu) looked interesting...

A lovely woman seated me, and gave me directions to the toilet. When I wandered back, bemused, she explained that the door slid rather than swung! On such small details swings (or slides?)  many a ... View the Post

Paris 2015: Street Things, and What People Were Wearing (part 1)

December 21, 2015   Something I lose sight of, between visits to Paris, is the fact that there is so much really great art on the streets. This trip, I was enjoying the various lions I saw ornamenting and guarding the buildings!  

While there were a lot of Christmas decorations all over Paris, they weren't as ubiquitous as they are here in Chicago. But some of them were really spectacular - worth the trip just to see them...

 

I saw some decorations that I thought were in questionable taste. I'm not crazy about fake snow under any circumstances, so flocked trees have never been my preference. But this just felt over the top:

 

And I took a couple of pictures that really ... View the Post

Paris Store Windows, December 2015

December 18, 2015

Oh, did I window shop....But before I get to that, I have to answer a question someone asked, before I forget: What about my hair care needs when I travel?

 

This is it. I shower in the evenings, and then untangle my hair again the morning, re-dampen it, and scrunch it with my hands. Stick in a headband, and I'm done! I haven't got a lot of patience for primping; if I had to blow dry my hair every day, I'd shave my head....

Makeup = lipgloss, and of course I'm wearing sunscreen. Done.

I have to suggest an very small, empty spray bottle to almost anybody who's going to fly. Yes, you can buy those Evian spray bottles that are going to outlive us all in a landfill, or you can get one of these and ... View the Post

The Streets of Paris, December 2015

December 17, 2015

I had a wonderful time, no hesitations, and no conditions or qualifications apply.

Were things in Paris a little bit different? Yes, a little bit. As I said yesterday, my flight was very "uncrowded", so I anticipated smaller crowds, which was indeed the case. Maybe the thing that I noticed first was that there were French flags on display in unexpected places, including quite a few hanging from the windows of apartments in the city. In some cases, the flag was just a sheet of paper with the flag printed on it, taped to the window. I didn't see thousands of them - this wasn't something organized - but that made it all the more striking and moving when it was ... View the Post

Getting to Paris from Chicago (and back again), December 2015

December 16, 2015

If you're considering going to Paris soon, DO IT! If nothing else, the trip over was MUCH easier than it's ever been before, in my experience. A lot of people on my flight were no-shows, which meant that lots of us had a ton of space. On both of my flights - to and from Paris - I had a window AND an aisle seat all to myself. On the trip over, some people had ENTIRE middle sections (three seats wide, maybe 4?) in which to stretch out and sleep somewhat comfortably.

I know that a lot of this is the result of no-shows, because I seriously considered upgrading my seat on both legs of the trip, and decided not to because of cost. When I viewed the seat maps online, they showed that there were very few free seats on ... View the Post

Back from Paris

and my circadian rhythms have NO rhythm. You'd think I would figure out jet lag....More very soon, when I've had some sleep. It was a WONDERFUL trip. If you're thinking about going to Paris, do it!

love, Janice ... View the Post