15 49.0138 8.38624 both 0 bullet 0 4000 1 0 horizontal https://www.messynessychic.com 300 4000

Category / Time travel

Unlocking the Mystery of Villa Frochot

Villa Frochot is one of the most mysterious buildings in Paris. Closed to the public (or so we thought), rumours and hearsay about the villa vary depending on who you ask. Reliable sources speak of its days as an erotic cabaret in the 1920s, and according to the barman at the end of the street,…

The Parisian Mushroom Catacombs

In a fresh episode of our Don’t Be a Tourist: Mini Bites series, I venture underground on a quest to find one a gastronomic legend in the Parisian catacombs … Catch up with the rest of the series here Hungry for more Paris? The updated edition of Don’t Be a Tourist in Paris is now available. Or become…

The Louvre’s Secret Apartments

The Louvre; or, as we’ve prefer to call it, Paris’ most exhaustingly gorgeous tourist trap. In the MessyNessy guide, Don’t Be a Tourist in Paris, there’s even a chapter called, “Anything but the Louvre” that steers folks away from its selfie-stick jungles, and into the arms of more overlooked museums in the city. But this weekend, we decided to pay…

Haunting Postcards of Parisian Homicide

Note: Some of the images below contain disturbing content. Alphonse Bertillon was bad at a lot of things, but excellent at two: solving crime, and pissing people off. Both were honed during his long career at the Prefecture de Police in mid-19th century Paris, one of the grisliest eras for tracking down criminals in the rapidly growing metropolis.…

Welcome to One of the Last Cinema Prop Houses in Paris

Alright, you can forget about all those other times, this time, I really did find Paris’ best-kept secret. It’s taken me almost a year to gain access to the 4,000 square meter prop house hidden in central Paris, one of the last three to still survive within the city. After several attempts at emailing them, I luckily discovered that I have…

Armenian Soul Food at a Secret Paris Restaurant

Behind an unmarked door in the 9th arrondissement, at the back of peaceful courtyard, I found another Paris secret. The kind of place that you would only hear about via word of mouth, I heard about it from a guy in a bar one night who was teasing a few of his favourite local secrets after one too many…

Time Travel to a 1930s Dance School in Paris

“Forget your troubles and dance” were the wonderful lyrics once sang by Bob Marley and he wasn’t far wrong as we stepped into an old dance school that sits quietly at the bottom of a paved courtyard in Saint Germain. (7th arr) Not to be fooled though as the seemingly quiet exterior says nothing about…

Investigating One of the Oldest Private Detective Agencies in Paris

If you were to wander around the 1er arrondissement in Paris, you might come across an intriguing, old looking green neon sign on an anonymous looking building on the Rue du Louvre. At night it captures the imagination, looking like a lot something from a film noir, saying simply “Duluc Détective”… The Duluc Détective might…

Your Ticket Aboard the World’s First Cruise Ship

Let’s take a cruise through history (see what I did there) aboard the SS Prinzessin Victoria Luise, a German passenger ship of the Hamburg-America Line launched in 1900 and credited with having been the first purpose-built cruise ship. It only spent six years in service before it was accidentally grounded off the coast of Jamaica (oops),…

The Little-Known Paris Jewel Box of Curiosities

“Take the right hallway to the staircase, which will take you to another staircase, that will lead you to a doorbell on the first floor” – the exact instructions to finding the Museum of Mineralogy tucked away in the university of MINES Paris Tech. Paris hides one of its most inspiring cabinets of curiosity behind university walls…

NEWER POSTS 1 … 14 15 16 … 113 OLDER POSTS