So, souvenirs?

Another travel-related post.

In one of my first posts about my early September wanderings I mentioned how hard it now is to find items specific to a place that aren’t available online/at home. March noted that she was generally pleased to be able to get things more easily and that made me think.

I didn’t buy anything souvenir-ish on my travels except in Paris, during the last few days of being away.

I did try to find something public transport related in Berlin for my son, for whom this is an interest. But, no dice.

If you look at Paris blogs/travel websites/vlogs most have lists of their top 10 things to take home with you that aren’t chachkas (eg, little Eiffel Towers – I do own one of these from decades ago – tee shirts, etc) but ‘genuine French things’. Most lists include cheese, butter (really – many shops can cool and shrink wrap for you), berets, striped Breton shirts, luxury handbags which are cheaper in the EU, wine (of course), perfume (again, of course), Dijon mustard, soaps, French pharmacy items (where the lists always included items that are easily findable outside France – eg, Caudalie, Avène).

None of these really had the least attraction for me. Plus, I look terrible in horizontal stripes.

So, I did some digging. I knew I’d have a go with the Diptyque shop for a candle, which are slightly less expensive in the EU given the exchange rate etc. But what else??

In the end, I only came up with four things I felt were special to Paris. And, really, all can be gotten where you live – ie, the places offer online shops.

Still, I felt these were a bit more Paris-specific than most of what I had read about.

The first item was the perfume samples from Binet-Papillon located in the Galerie Viviene in the 2^nd arrondissement which I wrote about several weeks ago. These aren’t widely available though they do ship (I’m not sure about worldwide) and they sounded interesting. I loved the little drawer-like boxes the samples came in and there is one that has gone on to the want list. After I’d sampled gently they went off to a friend.

Second is actually two pharmacy things that I dug up in searches. They can be procured here online but at only one shop and I wanted the pleasure of locating them during my wanderings. La Rosée suncream is SPF 50 and sounded enticing. So, I got a large tube of that at one pharmacy. I’d also read about the SVR dermatological brand and was eyeing a day cream with hyaluronic acid (SVR Biotic Regenerating Plumping Gel). The La Rosée wasn’t pricey; the moisturiser was mid-range – here, it lists for £45 for 50ml. I’ve only tested the SPF so far rather than using it daily as I have a tube of something else on the go. It smelled lovely and didn’t bother my skin at all. The moisturiser is a big success: light, emollient, lovely to use, and my skin seems to absolutely love it. Goes on the replace list from local website when it’s finished but it will still make me think of Paris.

Finally, in my searches I came upon a shop on the Left Bank (I spent almost all my time on the Right Bank and that’s where my hotel was) that offered idiosyncratic items which also seemed like specifically Paris souvenirs without being kitch-ie. Marin Montagut on the rue Madame (www.marinmontagut.com ) offers textiles, porcelain items, and some artists’ items printed with things like metro stop names, street names, French specific visuals (eg, croissants, the Eiffel Tower). Quirky, imaginative graphics. This too has an online shop and I do believe it ships widely. A silk scarf caught my attention printed with objects from the sky (the scarf is called armillary sphere).

While it isn’t quite as Paris-specific as some of the other prints – eg, there are neighbourhood scarves including the Marais and Montmartre – for whatever reason the one I chose felt very Paris to me. I also got my son a pasta bowl printed with rue de Paradis.

Oh, on the last morning, before getting the Eurostar, I got some croissants for home from a boulangerie fairly nearby that was very highly rated but not on the highly touristed lists. They were indeed very good and the only people in line were parents with kids and locals, it seemed, as everyone else bar me was speaking proper French, rather than just able to be polite.

I have to say I am very pleased with the things I brought home and I recommend all of them as a little less usual. However, I’m not sure for future trips if I’d make the same effort to seek out ‘different’ souvenirs. I’m not even sure, beyond the trinkets you can get from souvenir shops, that true souvenirs even exist. What do you think?

Pics: Pexels and mine