Winter = Architecture Funtimes

Whenever the drab skies and non-stop rain of Parisian winter threaten to bring me down, I go out of my way to find the silver lining in all the gray. One example: with all the leaves off the trees, you get unfettered views of lots of interesting architecture. Which gets you (meaning me) thinking about the two architectural faces of Paris.

The first face is the obvious one: Second Empire, Haussmanian, and belle époque buildings with iron-lattice railings, turrets, and/or a curved slate roof over a uniform concrete façade. There's a typical one-family mansion in the richer areas of the city, and of course Paris is famous for the way its uniformly proportioned boulevards lead the eye towards landmarks.


But there's also a post-war, high-modernist strain in Parisian architecture, especially in the traditionally poorer areas of the city that have seen the least preservation, the most reconstruction, and the most government (rather than private) involvement in architectural decisions. Belleville provides lots of great examples of this second strain, which touches churches (top and bottom left), businesses (top right), and homes (bottom right).


We could argue about how interesting, impressive, useful, or ugly we find these buildings. Some clearly respond to formal and functional requirements better than others. I find the two buildings below to be particularly lacking in foresight, although I have to admit that in a different context, the one on the right could be really cool.


There are also some really great examples of (what I consider) successful contemporary architecture in Belleville. The building below on the left is a day-care/community center, and the one on the right is some kind of insurance company. Both use glass in a way that helps them reflect (and therefore blend in with) the sky. And the insurance building, which anchors the Boulevard de Belleville/Rue de Belleville intersection, still manages to evoke the color of more traditional Parisian buildings. As you walk by, you might not notice that it's brand-spanking new, and that seems to be a cherished principal in Parisian architecture.


Even when you think you've found an exception to Parisian preferences for architecture uniformity and adherence to century-old standards, it turns out you haven't. Consider the Ministry of Culture and Communication, below. The building on the left is a typical, late-19th-century structure that's been covered with a stainless steel screen, which helps unify the building with a 2004 addition (on the right) by Francis Soler.

This daring integration of old and new seems to be Paris's best bet going forward, and I'm hoping the architect designing the building to fill the empty space right across the street from us does something similar!

High Humidity

Paris is an incredibly humid place, as we've mentioned before. With the colder temperatures we experienced last week, not to mention the presence of visitors, it's been harder to open windows and air the place out. The result? Condensation! Moisture! MOLD!!!

What our bedroom window looks like most mornings. Yes, that is all on the inside.

On rare days, there's so much water on the window that it actually runs down to the floor in tiny rivulets . . .

We discovered some mold growing on the window last week, and swiftly cleaned it off. No respiratory ailments here, please!

The basic problem is one of circulation; there is none in this apartment. That's why we need to alternate opening windows in each room for a little bit every day. That's also why it's good to keep a fan running sometimes, even though it makes it feel colder. Finally, that's why we invested in a déshumidificateur (dehumidifier), which manages to keep water off the windows, but only if it runs all night.

This little guy can only dehumidify 17 square meters at a time, so unless we empty it once over the course of the night, it fills up after running 5 or 6 hours.

Thanks, trusty déshumidificateur! Here's looking forward to spring!

Snow day!

We woke up this morning to a glorious and rare Parisian sight: snow!

Of course, we had to run right outside and play!

We even caught a glimpse of a certain jolly fellow's most famous eco-friendly flyer.

Cold Snap

As Maggie mentioned, we're in our first cold snap of the winter. By Boston standards, it isn't much: highs in the low 30s, at night it gets down into the low 20s, and if we're lucky we might even see some snow showers.

It turns out, though, that a difference of 10 degrees (the winter average high for Paris is about 44) is both seen and felt in Paris. For instance, those gutter gushers seem to have been turned off. Finally! It makes sense: this morning, on my way back from walking Panda in the park, I saw the frozen trickle of one that had been left on a little too long. I even stopped to take a picture (imagine Panda straining at the far end of the leash, me trying to hold the camera steady with one hand, both of us shaking from the cold). Unfortunately the picture didn't look great, but it inspired some conversation - a woman standing a few feet away asked why I had taken a picture, and I got to rant (live! in French!) about the city's wasteful street-cleaning techniques. I pointed out that they have to turn off the spigots when it goes below freezing because otherwise there'd be ice everywhere, and the spigots would probably break. The woman admitted she'd never thought about any of it before, and I walked away proud that I'd helped her see the light.

We notice the temperature difference in our apartment, especially, since we've finally been forced to turn the heaters on. No, that wasn't a typo - each room has a separate thermostat that runs a single electric radiator, which doesn't quite warm a whole room like baseboard heating, and especially not like central air heating. Oh well - it's not like it's going to be like this all winter. Forecast for Christmas: high of 48. Balmy!