In today’s Reader Mail:

can you read the la redoute site and see if they ship to the us?  found a bag i like but my french isn’t good enough to navigate. either way, could you recommend an easy way to get some french basics here?

Voila! La Redoute has a US site. Unfortunately, the only thing we want there is this hoodie. ("Hoody".) It is cheap, but it is not sufficient. LR hoodie, was $29.99, now $14.99

Otherwise: our first choice for French basic-y things is Zadig et Voltaire, which is about a billion euros out of our price range. Which leaves us with Petit Bateau:

Nothing fancy, but everyone needs tee shirts. Petit Bateau "chemise pointelle," $22

We had such little interest in seeing this movie before we saw this poster. But now. Things are different! Manohla Dargis wrote a brilliant piece on Sunday about how little women have to do in the movies: 

Nobody likes to admit the worst, even when it’s right up there on the screen, particularly women in the industry who clutch at every pitiful short straw, insisting that there are, for instance, more female executives in Hollywood than ever before. As if it’s done the rest of us any good. All you have to do is look at the movies themselves — at the decorative blondes and brunettes smiling and simpering at the edge of the frame — to see just how irrelevant we have become.

This could be awesome. At least Audrey’s not stuck being all Da Vinci Code assistant-y \ nominal love interest forever.

In today’s Reader Mail:

Dear Bunny,

I see that you were recently in Paris – le sigh! I leave for Paris this weekend; it’s my first time there. Since you manage to be sassy and fashion-y while being totally reasonable, I want to know: what are the must-pack items for gallery hopping, landmark visiting, marathon meals and general wandering about?

Lots of love,
C
Toronto

Oh, we just love the travel-y questions! First, we must say, our top top top recommendation for Paris will always be: Caves Saint-Gilles, a tapas restaurant in the Marais (our favorite neighborhood, btw.) It is amazing. It is so great we spent a birthday there, and our friend K. spoke Spanish to all the waiters, and it was amazing. We don’t even mind using that word twice, it was that great.

We spent our time in Paris on the border of the 4th and the 11th, and we prefer this part of the city to any other. Maybe it’s not the Louvre, but we love love love the Promenade Plantee, an elevated park tres pres de la Bastille—it’s the prettiest thing in Paris, especially at this time of year. We were there a week and a half ago, and it was fucking snowing. But we’ve been there this time of year in years previous, and it’s been perfect.

If you have any interest in contemporary art, we beg you not to miss the Sophie Calle show at the National Library.

Shopping wise, you have to hit Colette, Spree, and basically everywhere in the Marais—we are paper freaks so we adore Papier Plus, also in the Marais.

Anyway, this is clearly supposed to be about clothing. Three things hit us on this most recent trip:

1: We saw a million girls in swing jackets. Anthro swing set jacket, $118

2: High-waisted, wide-leg jeans. We didn’t think anyone actually wore these, but we saw them all over the place and were totally jealous. 18th Amendment Colbert jeans, $218

3: Scarves. We could practice for a thousand million years and we will never be able to wrap a scarf like a French woman can. Topshop scarf, $30

The dress floor at Colette! This is the picture we got yelled at for taking.

This is the reading room at the National Library in Paris, which in this case is interesting because it’s where Sophie Calle’s Take Care of Yourself is installed. It is amazing! If you’re in Paris between now and June 8, don’t miss it.We know, it’s not like the picture makes it look super fabulous or anything, but it is.

This is just one of the many racks of patent-y bags at our favorite French department store, Le Bon Marche. That is where we used to buy all our Oreos when we were there and they were still hard to find.

And at first we were all, what the fuck? But now we are like, er, you go, AJ McLean and your pirate earring.

So we’re just wrapping up a very short trip to Paris at the moment, though we did have time to get to Colette, the fashion store of all fashion stores. Our mission with Colette is to go there and see what they’re selling, because it’s usually awesome, and then not to credit them with it, because they’re so freaking mean there. (We plan on putting this into action later this week.)

We found the video above and it’s perfect because the two hosts (who read off notepads) talk about these bizarre Evian sprays exclusive to Colette. C’est vraiment bizarre, this whole idea of $4 limited-edition water sprays. Eh.

So the water sprays were not one of the awesome things. We did, however, like: all the clothes, the fashion magazine rack (which, if we’re correct, only two US titles: Paper and V), the giant Kiehl’s selection (all in all we felt very on top of their beauty choices—it was mostly Kiehl’s and Bumble and bumble), and this book, which we thought was so underground but is apparently #484 on Amazon, which seems awfully high to us. Looks super cool—a book about clandestine military operations, as told by their patches. And we freaking love patches. I Could Tell You But Then You Would Have To Be Destroyed By Me, $15.61

This isn’t exacccccctly what we were looking for, but it’s as close as we’re getting. Wood, Lucite, and raffia-wrapped bead necklace, $63.50

Hi there!

I’ve been reading Bunnyshop long enough to know how much we both love Fresh’s Sugar perfume. So I went to the Fresh store the other day to buy more, and I noticed the packaging had changed. I didn’t think anything of it, but when I got it home, I realized that it didn’t smell the same, it was more perfumey-flowery, and I thought, "Uh-oh."

So then a couple of days later, I went to my local beauty supply store, and I noticed that they had all their Fresh products marked 50% off. I asked them why, and they said, "We just got our new shipment of Fresh supplies, but when we opened the box, we realized that there were differences in the new stock, so we sent it all back and discounted our current stock. We’re not going to carry Fresh anymore."

It turns out that the Fresh company recently moved from France to New York, and that they’ve changed some of the formula of their products….including Sugar perfume! No!

Luckily, the salesgirl was supersweet and helpful (it turns out she was a Sugar fan, too), and she told me to try L’Occitane’s Honey & Lemon perfume. It’s not the same as Fresh—it smells more sweet & honey-ish—but I really like it.

Anyway, I was just wondering if you’ve heard anything about this, or if you had tried the new Sugar and noticed the difference.

Thanks!
RB

We investigate! All future Christiane Amanpours must begin somewhere, we feel. Though perhaps in an actual war zone. Anyhoo, we did find this very recent story about the Fresh founders and a new shop in Boston—maybe just the production has moved from France to New York? In any case, we certainly share the reader’s concern, as Fresh is a longtime favorite of ours, especially the lovely (if pricey) Sugar perfume. Our initial response: stockpiling!

Above: L’Occitane’s Honey and Lemon perfume, $44

In today’s Reader Mail:

Dear Bunnyshop,

This is pretty random, and I’m just trying to avoid thinking about Christmas shopping. But say all your clothes came from one online place, money is no object. What would it be? And please ask everyone else.

Just wondering,
K.

Oh! So it is really like, what store would be your personal stylist, or whatever. We like this question. Because we’re thinking the narrower the vibe of the store—we mean (and we wonder if it is clear that we just drove 18 hours straight across three states), it’d be easy if your choice was, like, Barneys, or Shopbop or something. But you’re sort of saying more if you go with a narrowly defined look.

Anyway, anyway. Our answer: APC. It is not so much that we want to be French as we want to live in a country where we have no access to cars, but plenty of access to bread.

Those shorts are so meh but it’s that whole, APC thing we love. And we’re totally into that sweater. Money being, of course, no object. Cashmere pullover, $305

Cafe Mode has the—and we are thinking of spelling that THE—best—BEST—street photos from the French shows up at the moment. Do. Not. Miss! Especially if you can read French. But really: either way!

Above, that’s Charlotte Gainsbourg in her Balenciaga jacket and we love her forever and always.

Hurrah! And so begins summer. We loooove summer. And we are going to especially love this summer because we have arranged a whole! Series! Of discount codes! And Shopping Paris Mode is just the first for the season. (We recently discussed them recently regarding their April, May line, which is super excellent.) Anyway, we begin with this dress. We love that this model is not anorexic. Why can’t we have non-anorexic models here? Why do the French get everything?

Anyway. Cute dress! And just for us: 25% off! Actually, the whole site (minus shipping, they tell us) is 25% off. This is just today’s suggestion. Nothing says summer like a black dress and big sunglasses, we’re thinking, unless it’s sitting in a hot car at one of the toll booths on the Parkway.

This is the Eurythmic Mia dress, formerly $175, with discount code JOUR-REDU-FETE-MERE (we know it’s a little more unwieldy than usual, and we swear this is special for us—without the intervention the Fete Mere code would have expired tomorrow. In case we were sounding like ass wipes) $131.25

Related posts:

The Summer Black Dress
Summer Black Dresses, Continued
Introducing (To Us, At Least) April, May