Paris (1)

OMG it's been a busy few weeks visiting both Paris and Venice and tomorrow I head off to London (yes you guessed more ballet).   I need to try and catch you all up on things so I will give it a go!  
OK let's start with a look at Paris -

My plane arriving to take me to Paris.

Bill Board outside the Grand Palais

  

I went to see the WONDERFUL Cartier Le Style et L'Histoire Exhibition at the Grand Palais - and also I was able to catch a performance of the ballet Onegin at the Opera Garnier - more of that later.

I made the very wise decision to buy 2 tickets to see Cartier on separate days - it was the right decision - there was so much to see and take in it was rather overwhelming so a chance to see it all again the next day was great because my brain could absorb what I saw the first day and compute it all and then I knew what I wanted to see again.  Do you ever get that fuzzy head feeling when you go to exhibitions or is just me?  I just can't take in what the label or audio guides are telling me!  





Anyway let's have a little dip into the exhibition - after a tiny wait to drop off my coat I went up the stairs to the darkened Salon d'Honneur which is a large grand room - obviously it was darkly lit for the exhibition to showcase the jewellery but they had images of jewellery playing across the ceiling and walls which was quite striking as you can see in my photograph.  (YES photos were allowed!!!!)

The Salon d'Honneur with jewellery images
playing on the darkened walls.

As you went into the room the first thing you saw was a tall cylindrical cabinet slowly moving round and displaying 8 beautiful of the most beautiful tiaras...the diamonds were amazing.  You can get an idea of the sparkle from the video below.

I did not pay much attention to the labels so sadly I cannot tell you the name or owner of this tiara but this Russian style Kokoshnik style is lovely and this was my favourite tiara the detail was gorgeous and I liked the addition of the little pearls too which you can see well in the photo below.  I can tell you a lot of the pieces on display were either part of the Cartier Archive or on loan from Qatar Museum as well as from individuals and royal houses.

This shape tiara is known as the Kokoshnik 
style typical of Russia.

Here an ornate scroll tiara - this featured on the
T-shirt for the V&A Tiaras exhibition a few 
years ago - I have one somewhere!

This tiara was I think once part of the 
Danish royal collection.

This might be the Essex Tiara - I am not sure!

There were lots more tiaras on display in other cabinets dotted around the room and I will show you some more in my next post. There was one very special royal tiara too ;-)