As impressive as the museums and monuments of Paris are, the smaller establishments—bakeries, bookstores, boutiques, bars, and brasseries—are just as likely to put you under the city’s spell.
Or maybe even more so. Because while you might have prepared yourself in advance for the sight of the Arc de Triomphe, the nearly unbearable adorableness of some Paris shops can take you by surprise. Before you know it, you could find yourself as thoroughly enchanted by the French capital as the cringiest of Emily in Paris cosplayers.
Something akin to the astonishment and delight of strolling Paris neighborhoods is captured by illustrator Joel Holland in his new book, Paris Shopfronts (Prestel; $30).
As in his previous collections highlighting eye-catching storefronts in New York City and London, Holland (pictured above) takes readers on a wide-ranging visual tour of Parisian commerce, from “heavy-hitter historic cafés and famous fashion outposts,” as he puts it in the book’s introduction, to “an extensive array of diverse, unique businesses that show the city’s wonders” in the fields of taxidermy, lingerie, Moroccan cuisine, macaron making, and a whole lot more.
In all, a whopping 200 different shopfronts get their own illustrations conveying jewel-box charm and a cabinet-of-curiosities degree of detail. Accompanying text by Paris-based journalist Vivian Song supplies info on what makes each stop special, while street addresses and illustrated maps help you build an itinerary to see your faves in real life.
Below, we’ve gathered a sampling of images from the book as a kind of amuse-bouche for dreaming about your own entrancing meander through Paris.
