Kathy Borrus - Five Hundred Buildings of Paris

PHOTOGRAPHY BY JORG BROCKMANN AND JAMES DRISCOLL

TEXT BY KATHY BORRUS

Copyright 2003 by Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, Inc.
Text copyright 2003 by Kathy Borrus
Original photography copyright 2003 by Jorg Brockmann and James Driscoll

Permission to depict specific buildings is granted as follows:
Le Corbusier: , image 865, all 2003 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/ADAGP, Paris/FLC.

Ieoh Ming Pei: , image 668, all courtesy of the architects.

Other architects: , image 770;

, image 998, all 2003 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/ADAGP, Paris/FLC.

The following architects and organizations have also kindly granted permission to depict their buildings: Architecture Studio, Mery Belmont, Jean-Michel Wilmotte, Philippe Gazeau, Edith Girard, Michel Herbert, Michel Kagan, Jacques Ripault, Gerard Thurhauer, Jean-Paul Viguier, Jacques Vitry, Dominique Hertenberger, Hotel de Matignon, Palais de lElyse, Aline Vellay, Mairie de Paris.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher.

ISBN 978-1-57912-858-6

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the offices of Black Dog & Leventhal, Inc.

Published by
Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, Inc.
151 West 19th Street
New York, New York 10011

Distributed by
Workman Publishing Company
225 Varick Street
New York, New York 10014

Five hundred buildings? my architect friend asked. How can I get an assignment like that?

Other friends also salivated at the idea of writing about five hundred Paris buildings and immediately began offering resources and suggestions.

Armed with everyones recommendations and my own passion for art and architecture, I traipsed off to Paris with a different perspective: looking up, while simultaneously watching my step. (Parisians love their dogs as much as their buildings.)

Creating a list and wading through layers of architecture and history to write about that many buildings inevitably required the assistance of many people along the way. First and foremost, I cannot find enough superlatives to describe the immeasurable ways Gal Lesterlin contributed to this book. His expertise, guidance, research, fact-checking, list review, encouragement, and tireless efforts were invaluable. As an architect and Ph.D. candidate in the history of architecture, his passion for exploring the history behind the faades was contagious and affected me in ways I could not anticipate. I appreciate his insight, dedication, friendship, and good humor in cheering me on and seeing this project to conclusion. Thanks to Florence Lloyd, Claude Baudez, and Basile Baudez whose cumulative recommendations led me to Gal.

Next, Thirza Vallois, author of the Around and About Paris guides and Romantic Paris, deserves special mention for her initial interest and her expert knowledge of the city, along with my thanks for wandering the Parisian streets with me. Her guides, chock full of history, are among the many sources I consulted for information.

My thanks also go to Karyn Marcus. Her sustained enthusiasm and early background work on the book were essential to its success. Her numerous suggestions, contacts, translations, and organizational ability aided me in creating and researching the initial list. Our walks through the city knew no bounds and increased our camaraderie. And Id like to extend our mutual thanks to Jean Connehaye for his support of the project and list review. He lent his time and expertise, as well as his valuable research books; chief among these was the excellent Dictionnaire Historique des rues de Paris by Jacques Hillairet. For all of Mr. Connehayes efforts, I am sincerely grateful. Our additional thanks for consultation go to Julia Trilling and Olivier Amat.

Ultimately, the text drew inspiration from the photographic artistry of Jorg Brockmann and James Driscoll. Adept at finding frequently difficult addresses and weaving their way through narrow streets, they brought their creative vision to each of the five hundred buildings in the book.

To all of my family and friends at home, thanks for your encouragement and patience while I disappeared to explore Paris. My special thanks and love to my son, Josh, who helped research literary references when needed and reviewed numerous paragraphs before I submitted them.

Finally, my appreciation extends to J.P. Leventhal for his faith in me and the opportunity to contribute to this book, as well as to Laura Ross for her editorial guidance, encouragement, and gentle pressure throughout the writing process. My thanks also to the staff and freelancers of Black Dog & Leventhal for their efforts, especially Dara Lazar, Sheila Hart, Iris Bass, True Sims, and Magali Veillon.

KATHY BORRUS

Id like to dedicate this book to the memory of Alain Colomb, my father-in-law, a man of great courage and integrity, and to Aline; to my wife Celine, my kids Leo and Sasha, my grandmother Oma Lisa, and above all, to my parents, who moved to Paris in 1970, as a young couple, and brought us up there. They are responsible for my love of the city.

After spending the last decade in New York, I was able to approach Paris with a fresh eye. I was eager to rediscover a city that I had known from a comfortable, day-to-day perspective: the traffic hassles, the noise, the agitation. (I had found that when I shot the photographs for One Thousand New York Buildings I wanted to reduce these extraneous factors to a minimum to allow readers to concentrate on the essence of each building.) I will never forget the weekend when the center of the city was closed to traffic. Walking through the streets without the fear of getting run over, and the unusual quietness, afforded me a unique perspective.

I did not approach Paris with an idealized, romantic vision. The work remains first and foremost a factual record. And yet, through choices of perspective, framing, and the time of day that I took the shot, each photograph takes on a mood or quality of its own. When photographing restaurants, it often seemed more interesting to portray the interior, where the history of the place had unfolded.

For those interested in the technical side of things, all of the photographs in this book were shot with a Sinar F2 4 x 5 camera shooting Agfa APX 100 film.

I would like to extend my thanks, first, to my collaborator, James Driscoll; to my assistants, Fanny Dupont and Matteo Venet; and to Nicolas Spuhler of the Geneva-based lab Actinic, for their hard work and enthusiasm. I am grateful to Maryvonne Deleau at the Mairie of Paris for helping me get access to certain sites; to Catherine and Michel Devos and Francoise and Philip Proust for lodging, and to Marie Franoise Deslandes, Alain Bled, and Jean Connehaye for their help. Congratulations to Kathy Borrus for her thorough research and writing job. My gratitude also goes to the whole team at Black Dog and Leventhal, especially to J.P. Leventhal, for giving me the opportunity to take on this project. Thanks to Laura Ross, my editor, for her strong (moral and practical) support, and to True Sims and Dara Lazar for their painstaking efforts on this complex undertaking. Thanks also to Thomas Palmer, a master separator, and to Sheila Hart for completing the design equivalent of the Rubiks Cube with great style and good cheer.