In a stroke of pure genius, photographer Karen Knorr has combined two of the world’s best things—ornate French interiors and taxidermy wildlife—to create a photo series that is part fairytale, part nightmare, part chateau party. In other words, it doesn’t get much better than this.

Running between February 10 and May 30 at Paris’ Musée Carnavalet, “Fables—Photographies” features a series of 15 large-scale photos that involve various creatures (foxes, squirrels, beavers, flamingos) inhabiting the elegant salons of renowned French chateaux Chambord and Chantilly. Famed Parisian taxidermist Deyrolle loaned many of the animals featured in the works, and Knorr’s quirky compositions bring them to life in unexpected—yet strangely appropriate—settings. A squirrel and a fox contemplate a marble staircase, two stags lock horns in a grand foyer, a rabbit scampers beneath Louis XV chairs.

As it turns out, a world run by four-legged aristocrats makes perfect sense after all, and Knorr’s flight of fancy seems a fitting way to welcome spring to the City of Light.

Free entry. Musée Carnavalet. Open Tues-Sun 10am-6pm. 23, rue de Sévigné, 75003 Paris. Tel: 01 44 59 58 58.

If you’re a design aficionado and you’re not already en route to Paris for this year’s Maison et Objet trade show you might want to check yourself. The annual fair (a self-proclaimed “fashion show” for home furnishings) is a vital pilgrimage for those who are—or want to be—players in the global design industry. Each year trends are set, careers are launched, and design junkies the world over breathe a sigh of relief when the news is announced: design is alive and well… at least, in Paris.

This year’s show takes place from January 22-26, and while it’s open only to design professionals, there are plenty of related parties to lure the social set. The emphasis remains, however, on the art, and this year’s innovators are continuing to raise the bar. Of particular note is up-and-coming design studio NOCC, run by Paris-based designers Juan Pablo Naranjo and Jean-Christophe Orthlieb. Selected as one of the Talent à la Carte studios to be featured at the show, NOCC will be displaying their “Object of Sound,” “Radiation,” and “Undished” collections.

If you can make it to Paris for the show (or just to converge with creatives and soak up the vibe), do so. And if you can’t, fear not. Whatever happens here this weekend will inevitably make its way to you—in some form or fashion—soon enough.

Staying out all night is nothing new for Parisians, but this weekend, they will do so in the name of art. This Saturday, October 3, Paris’ Nuit Blanche returns for its 8th year. This free annual event (which translates roughly to “sleepless night”) celebrates art’s integral role in the life of the city and its diverse communities.

While this year’s fete has no explicit theme, it is dedicated to the notion of exploration, and visitors can follow prescribed “dream-like trails” mapped out in various Paris neighborhoods. As in years past, the Marais will form the center of the event, but exhibitions and installations will be featured in northern Paris (in and around the Parc Buttes-Chaumont) and on the Left Bank (in the Jardin du Luxembourg and the Latin Quarter).

From sundown until sunset, artists from around the world will display their work in the city’s churches, galleries, museums, parks, theaters, and plazas. The art itself ranges from photo and painting exhibitions, to performance art, to musical performances, to interactive installations. Featured artists include Doug Aitken, Vincent Olinet, Nathan Coley, and dozens of others.

All venues and exhibitions are free and open to the public throughout the night. Designated pubic transport (metro lines 11 and 14 and night buses) operate all night long to help facilitate the event.

For more details and to download a full program with a map of the “dream-like trails” (in English), visit their website.

I’ve long believed that Paris and New York are jealous lovers-mutually obsessed, covetous, but still fiercely stubborn and, ultimately, true only to themselves. Nowhere is this dynamic more apparent than in the kitchen, where American innovation has borrowed from (and then challenged) the French standard that has dominated for so long.

This Friday and Saturday (the 25th and 26th), in a glorious and long overdue collision of American and French culinary love, P.S. 1 will play host to Le Fooding d’Amour Paris-New York. “Le Fooding,” the French culinary movement that celebrates food-made-with-feeling, has long applauded upstart chefs and their efforts to shake up the French food scene. This weekend, some of New York’s best (David Chang, Wylie Dufresne, Daniel Boulud) will showcase their craft alongside some of Paris’ wiliest culinary talents.  Among the French attendees are Inaki Aizpitarte (Le Chateaubriand), Stéphane Jégo (L’Ami Jean), Yves Camdeborde (Le Comptoir du Relais), and others.  

Cocktails from both sides of the Atlantic will be flowing, as will music from Paul Sevigny (New York) and Kolkoz and Benjamin Moreau (Le Baron, Paris). All proceeds support Action Against Hunger.

It’s easy to forget about Canada. It’s generally a very quiet country. But from now until July 12^th, Montreal will be anything but quiet as the city celebrates its 30^th Annual Festival International de Jazz de Montréal. The jazz festival kicked off July 1^st with an outdoor performance by Stevie Wonder (a tribute to Michael Jackson), and will continue with 700 (mostly free) concerts until its close on July 12^th.

Much of downtown Montreal has been transformed to accommodate the festival’s outdoor performances. And now that the snow has melted (just barely) it’s a wonderful time to celebrate summer—and music—in one of the East Coast’s most dynamic cities. This year’s performers include 3,000 musicians from 22 countries. On the program: Montreal’s own Patrick Watson, the Afro-Cuban All Stars and Cuba’s Los Van Van, Toots & the Maytals, Texan soul-singer Diunna Greenleaf, and Brooklyn-based Beirut (led by Zach Condon).

For those who swore off music forever after Michael Jackson’s death two weeks ago, perhaps you’ll reconsider in the name of jazz.

As the summer crowds descend on Paris, art lovers would do well to avoid the Louvre in favor of the more discrete exhibitions that are popping up in neighborhoods around the city. This Friday, the 7th edition of the “Parcours Saint Germain” draws to a close after a two-week run in Paris’ 6th arrondissement. The Parcours, an annual contemporary art exhibition, celebrates the creative spirit of the Saint Germain neighborhood by inviting 30 international artists to create work inspired by a specific theme. The works are exhibited throughout the district, on display in public squares, historic cafes, hotels, and luxury boutiques.

This year’s theme—“Playtime”—evokes the spirit of childhood, prompting artists to explore the world of children’s games, to skirt the boundaries between the logical and the absurd, to blur the lines between the world we inhabit and the world we imagine. Locals won’t need to go out of their way to view the exhibits, which are on display at neighborhood institutions like the Café de Flore (Guy Limone), Les Deux Magots (Gérard Pétremand), Louis Vuitton (Philippe Ramette), Sonia Rykiel (Elisa Strada), Place St. Germain-des-Prés (Tadashi Kawamata and Nicolas Buffe), and even the local Monoprix (Xiao Fan). Grocery shopping has never been so thought-provoking.

As always, St. Germain continues to be a neighborhood where art and community collide.

The show runs through June 12th at various locations throughout the 6th arrondissement.

Images (left to right): Arnaud Pyvka, courtesy Le BANK galerie, Paris and Parcours Saint Germain. Philippe Ramette, croquis du projet pour Louis Vuitton, 2009. Courtesy Galerie Renos Zippas, Paris and Parcours Saint Germain.

By the time Freemans brought taxidermy to the Manhattan masses, Deyrolle had already been using dead animals to woo clients for over 170 years. Established in 1831, Paris’ much-loved temple to taxidermy (and other “natural curiosities”) is, for many Parisians, a place where childhood dreams—and a few nightmares—come to life.

When a fire consumed the shop in the winter of 2008, many feared that the destruction was insurmountable and the death of the institution inevitable. But thanks to the combined fundraising efforts of art collectors, local financiers, French luxury brands, and other Deyrolle loyalists, the shop has been nearly fully restored over the past year.

In April, the “cabinet de curiosités” re-opened, and over the course of the coming year, it will serve as an exhibition space for artists whose work explores the natural world. The first exhibition—Touché par le Feu (Touched by Fire)—aptly features French photographer Martin d’Orgeval’s photos of the Deyrolle fire’s aftermath. In a powerful homage to the items that were destroyed, his photos smolder with quiet intensity, exploring the paradoxes that Deyrolle has always embodied—the space between life and death, between dream and reality, between science and art.

Thanks to d’Orgeval’s discerning eye, we can rest assured that the fire that threatened to destroy our beloved Deyrolle will soon be just a small piece of the shop’s enduring story.

D’Orgeval’s photos are on display (and on sale) at Deyrolle through May 6th. His book, also entitled Touché par le Feu is on sale as well.

Deyrolle 46 rue du Bac 75007, Paris. Tel : + 33 (0) 1 42 22 30 07 | Hours: 10am-7pm (Tues-Sat), 10am-1pm and 2pm-7pm (Mon). Closed Sundays.

On April 1^st, the much-anticipated “The Selby is in your Place” show opened at Colette, Paris’ unrivaled bastion of all things cool. Members of the art, fashion, music and design worlds mixed and mingled while browsing the paintings, photographs and illustrated interviews that comprise the show. Photographer Todd Selby was on-site to sign copies of his new book, The Selby Paris, whose 250 copies were produced exclusively for Colette.

The exhibition is Selby’s first solo show, not to mention his first formal foray into the dynamic Parisian art/design scene. In the tradition of his much-loved blog, The Selby, the show explores the notion that interesting people create interesting spaces in which to live and work. Some of the artwork on display is archival, profiling people in locales such as Los Angeles, London, New York, Sydney, and Mexico. Much of the material, however, is new and Paris-specific. Through his unconventional but intimate exploration of his subjects, Selby manages to capture an accurate yet provocative cross-section of contemporary Paris. He takes us from the sleek home of Pierre Hermé—pastry chef and king of the French macaron—to that of Frédéric Beigbeder, the notorious
enfant terrible of the French literary world. Selby’s informal “interview” style reveals eccentricities that would otherwise fly under the radar: we see his subjects’ handwriting, their drawings of their significant others, their doodles. He prompts them to admit their fears, their goals, and the grossest thing they’ve ever eaten (“very small fried fishes with black small cute eyes” in the case of stylist Nadège Winter). And of course, we see their homes, their furniture, their favorite possessions, their clutter, their pets, and their Star Wars figurines.

In addition to the show itself, Colette is also selling Selby’s signed books and other limited edition merchandise including tote bags, t-shirts, skateboards, “hair” bracelets, Adam and Eve salt shakers, and other decorative items that will infuse any home with a hint of “The Selby.”

The show runs from April 1-May 2 at Colette, 213 Rue Saint-Honoré, 75001 Paris.