Weekend brunch ii

Back in April, I did a little weekend brunch round-up from all iPhone photos. I thought it'd be appropriate for another one as we had into the weekend (there may be a few repeats in there). Standouts are definitely Empellon Cocina and Back Forty West. Also very enjoyable (if you can handle the wait) is Clinton Street Baking Co. - share an order of pancakes and wash it down with another savory dish. Another thing - Clinton Street, Penelope, and Prune will have the longest waits if you don't go early (or in the case of Prune, you pretty much need to get in line about 10 minutes before doors open). And damn I eat a lot of fries...


1 // 2 // 3 // 4 // 5 // 6 // 7 // 8 // 9 // 10

Happy brunching!

Peony studies

I am so thrilled to have peonies this late in the season that I had to do (yet another) post dedicated to their beauty. Inspired by the stunning "natura morta" section in Gentl and Hyers' portfolio, though I am not even at the tip of the iceberg in manipulating light like they do.

Let's just admire these peonies.

Governors Island | Jazz Age Lawn Fest

A few weekends ago, we boarded the Governors Island ferry to get a little taste of the Jazz Age. The festival features live music, some dance instruction, and tons of dance, not to mention it is quite the sartorial feast for the eyes. Bill Cunningham was there, in his blue jacket of course, grinning and shooting the whole time. I brought my Contax along for the ride - it isn't easy manually focusing on dancers, but I managed to get a few in. All shot on Portra 160. (Love the girl's dress in the 7th row down!)

Maybe some day, I can finally out grow my three left feet and learn how to do some of those dances... but I'm not counting on it. :P

Happy friday

A few stragglers from Paris markets and flower shops to share today...

Have a nice weekend!

Sarah + Ian | An intimate NYC wedding

When Daniel Krieger approached me about shooting a wedding at Per Se under his brand as an associate photographer, I could not say 'yes' more quickly. What made the deal even sweeter was that Sarah and Ian are seriously some of the nicest people I've come across working in this industry. So thank you, Daniel, for giving me this opportunity! I chose a few frames from their wedding to share - you can probably tell I was drooling over Sarah's bouquet and dress all day.

We started at the Sofitel near Bryant Park...


... and headed outside for them to do a first look. Check out the sign they made from chemical elements (they are both chemists)! I love some good nerdy fun. We then grabbed a few photos in the charming Upper West Side.


And the ceremony begins! It was a sweet, intimate gathering. I may or may not have shed a few tears myself...


And finally, a few details from Per Se. I had the privilege of eating off the salon menu (which, by the way, is a great alternative to the dozen+ course tasting and you don't need reservations), basically extending my French food gluttony for just a bit longer, as I had just gotten back from Paris. I was sent home with a sleeve of macarons and shortbread cookies from Per Se (thank you, Sarah and Ian!) - seriously, can I shoot more weddings here, please? ;)

Jazzy

This edition of 'his and hers' was made by possible by the lovely Jen Sosa, who took these photos at the Jazz Age Lawn Fest this past weekend. We didn't quite go all out as other attendees did (a post on this to come when I have my film back!), but tried to make do with what we had. I put no effort into making my hair look 20s, as it has never cooperated with anything I've tried to do. I don't think it can even hold a curl for ten minutes.

J scrapped together his outfit from Sperry Top-siders, J.Crew pants/shirt/bowtie, H&M vest, and a hat he picked up at the event. My dress/earrings/bracelets are Forever 21, with Lanvin flats and Chanel wallet on chain (um yeah, there may have been quite a bit of shopping in Paris as well...).


Photos c/o Jen Sosa. :)

Gratuitous shot of me by J from the Fuji x100. How awesome is that doorway!

Paris scenes on film

For having only shot two rolls on film on Paris, I sure eked out a hefty number of blog posts. Bear with me for this somewhat miscellaneous photo dump of Paris scenes. Although I friggin' love NYC, Paris sure makes NYC buildings and apartments look downright ugly. We've got lots of brick, but they have this beautiful cream-grey stone. Every street way I looked down was another photo to be made.

By the way, all of my Paris photos are available to be purchased as prints. I've started listing a few on Etsy but just give me a holler if you'd like any of the ones I've posted on here. Merci! :)

Some pretty things

Some peonies we bought for our AirBnB apartment in Paris. Have a great weekend, all!

P.S. I did a little interview here for Jorge Quinteros's Photographer Spotlight series. :)

Where we had coffee in Paris

Ah, coffee. Often when I'm traveling, one of the biggest things I miss is how easy it is to get a great cup of joe in NYC. We had been warned that the coffee (mostly espresso) in Paris was overall pretty terrible and that it'd be hard to get just a plain cup of drip. Looks like we got quite lucky on our first day. I used Yelp (forgive me) to find Télescope as it was just a hop away from where we were staying. If you recall, we were basically barely conscious at this point in our trip - coffee was in dire order. As soon as I saw the little aqua-colored espresso cups and saucers, I perked up.

Then we noticed the fancy pour-over device (that we've only ever seen before in the dearly departed RBC in NYC and please, can I have this built-in my kitchen one day) and REALLY perked up. We knew we had to come back. The only slightly confusing thing was that we ordered macchiatos and they tasted more like what cortados do here. Hey, I love cortados so that's fine. We chatted with Nicolas, the owner (?), and learned that the cafe just opened about two months ago. He gave us recommendations for other cafes and mentioned he loved Abraço here (!!). Clearly, I trusted him after that fact. :P I also loved that we bumped into the same people the few times we went; it felt like the perfect neighborhood spot. It also felt like the ex-pat spot as we heard much more English than French any time we were there.

One note about all these photos - I brought in photos from my iPhone, Contax 645, and 5Dmkii, so apologies for the inconsistency. It's driving me a little crazy.


Now, Le Bal was a bit of a trek for us, but we headed there one morning for coffee and brunch. We got some Chemex (shhhemex as they say there) and I think I had some sort of ham/egg/cheese sandwich. I think one thing we also noticed was just how leisurely everyone (staff and cafe-goers alike) is at Paris cafes. I've gotten so used to the pace here that if I feel like things aren't running quickly or efficiently, I get pretty antsy and uneasy. I mean in NY, at a busy brunch hour, the wait staff would be rushing you out the door, but there you can really take your damn time.


On that same day we had brunch at Le Bal, we wandered over to Kooka Boora (or I think it's known just as KB now). The menu was quite extensive - you can get regular drip, clever drip, aeropress, french press, syphon, and even a "degustation" of three different methods. Of course there was a long espresso drink list as well. We enjoyed sitting outside for a bit and trying to recover from our brunch food coma.


On our last day in Paris (aka the day J was still hungover from Ledoyen and we were on our way to L'Arpège), we made a quick detour to Coutume Café. The space was lovely but we couldn't stay for long.


Whew that felt like a serious mega-post. We did have some bad coffee along the way, but I won't be sharing those here. Overall, I'd say these places did us quite well and if you can only make one of these on any of your future trips to Paris, do go to Télescope!

Ledoyen

Another memorable meal we had in Paris was our dinner at Ledoyen. The dining room is stunning, with schmancy plush chairs, plush stools for my bag, long candlesticks on each table, wrap-around windows, and elaborate flower arrangements all around - like nothing I've seen in NY. Even though this dinner didn't start until 8:30PM or so, you can see that the light coming from outside (bless those late sunsets) was still quite nice (up until the cheeses :P). The service was also of a different caliber than what we've seen in the U.S. It's amazing how many languages the servers have to know there and how readily they switch from speaking in English to our table, and then Italian to the next.

Yet another difference from our dining experiences over here is that the tasting menus there are quite a bit cheaper than ordering a la carte (where plates are 90-120+ Euros a piece, yikes!). In NY, tasting menus are usually the splurge. I did, however, accidentally order a 45 Euro glass of champagne. The worst part is I don't think I even finished it. Oops.

Our main dishes included langoustine cooked two ways, turbot with truffles and potatoes, and a giant hunk of sweetbread. Probably more sweetbread at once than I've eaten in my life. And then way more sweets than we could stomach. See the spread below (all Fuji x100).


So many saucers for my tea cup! We had a wonderful time, although lunch at L'Arpège the next day was more than a bit aggressive. For J at least. I was starving by 5AM the next morning.

Tuileries at golden hour

One evening in Paris, we walked over to the Louvre grounds hoping to walk through the Tuileries Garden at dusk. Unfortunately it was just closing, and the gates were already up. I took a number of these photos sticking my Contax through the gate openings and just doing the best I could. It was probably for the best that we couldn't walk through, as the garden was swarming with mosquitoes. Even getting these few shots from the outskirts had me eaten alive. I wasn't sure how the film would pick up on the beautiful light, but I was happy to see it was able to capture some of the magic. I was terrible at editing down these photos, so I included multiples of similar scenes. The first and last are my favorites.

I mean, seriously, is it a different sun over there? Can I just bring this light with me to NYC please?