floors of Paris

Anyone who knows me at all is well aware that I have a..... specialty.  I wear one red chuck and one blue chuck, almost religiously.  The story is familiar to most: when I was little my favorite book was about an elephant and a dog who traded one shoe with the each other so that they could wear a red shoe and a blue shoe like their favorite TV character.  When I grew up a little, I found myself with a pair of red chucks and a pair of blue chucks and I decided that I would fulfill my childhood dream of wearing a red shoe and a blue shoe.  And I liked it so much that I never switched back to single-colored shoe pairs.  It's become a little something that defines me, something for which I'm well-known, in both America and France.

Well, from this sprung a sort of art project.  I'm no artist, but sometimes I like to make believe, so I pretended I was while in Paris.  I decided to photograph my slightly famous shoes with as many unique and interesting floors of Paris that I could.  I also was largely uninterested in capturing all of the famous landmarks of Paris when I knew that my shots wouldn't add new perspective to familiar scenes.  I wanted to be able to show Paris, a city well-known in photographs, in a different way and tell its story from a slightly upside-down perspective, and thus was born my foot-photographing syndrome.

If you scroll down, you will see the good shots or semi-good shots from this project.  I have more, but unfortunately people in Paris don't much appreciate it when you stop randomly while walking in order to photograph your feet, so more than one favorite shot turned blurry in an attempt to speed up the stopping.  Under each photograph, I've added a small description of where it was taken so that if you ever get a neck cramp while in Paris and you can only look at your feet, you'll know where you are.

My feet with those of my host sister at Versailles.

Versailles.

Versailles.

Versailles.

Versailles.

Versailles.

Versailles.

Versailles.

Versailles.

Versailles.

A courtyard at Versailles.

Underneath the Eiffel Tower.

The Louvre.

The Louvre.

The Louvre.

The Louvre.

GAP at the Champs Elysees.

Under l'Arc de Triomphe.

Outside the Grand Opera.

On the doorstep of a store on l'avenue de la paix.

Sidewalk of l'avenue de la paix.

Sidewalk of l'avenue de la paix.

Sidewalk of l'avenue de la paix.

Crossing place de la concorde.

On the steps in front of Sacre Coeur among cigarette butts and beer caps.

Entering Sacre Coeur.

In Sacre Coeur.

In Monmartre.

La rue azais.

La place St. Pierre.

The Paris metro.

Les pouces.

Les pouces d'antiquites.

The Montparnasse train station.