Proper Magazine hits Paris, Top Ten

So any-way, being Stockport’s answer to Karl Lagerfeld and Gok Wan, we headed over to Paris last weekend to check out the Capsule and Rendez-Vous trade shows. Something neither of us thought we’d ever end up doing but since issue ten of the mag has blown everyone’s socks off and very nearly sold out in just a month. We decided it’s time to take this clothing lark seriously, well as seriously as we can be. There’ll be a full on write up of our hi-jinks in issue 11 but I just thought I’d share a few pics from me phone that I took in-between air-kissing P Diddy and trying on reindeer-skin capes.

1 .The food –Within an hour of hitting the city I was eating Foie-Gras. Yes I know it’s wrong but if I only eat it a couple of times in my life it’s OK isn’t it? For the rest of the trip I just ate bloody steaks and veal. Morrissey if you’re reading this I’m sorry. If it’s any consolation I had a veggie pizza in a restaurant on the last night. Though I did ask if they could put lardons/chorizo on it and was met with the legend ‘pas d’ici’ before noticing we were the only ones in there not wearing skull-caps.

2. Mint statue – Came across this beautiful bit of sculpture honouring the American and French troops in WW2. Shame that some dickhead saw fit to spray a fucking giraffe on it.

3. Mark and Land-marks – As my fellow editor Mark has never been to Paris before I felt duty-bound to give him a whistle stop tour of the place. You can’t really go there without seeing the The Arc of triumph, Eiffel Tower, the Moulin Rouge and a dog with a mane can you?

4. Cinq-oh in the area – Whilst checking out the Eiffel tower, we noticed a poor African fellow getting nicked by ‘les flics’ All his mates were shouting at them to let him go but they fell on deaf ears. They even offered tempting bribes such as three paper-weights for the price of two with some miniature bongo drums thrown in but the cops were having none of it. They just carted him off to the nearest guillotine (probably) without even offering him a backie.

5. Sexy posters – Maybe it’s all the red meat/wine but for whatever reason Paris has something of a reputation for being sexy. I had to fend Mark off with my bumbag several times during the night. As the fruity posters he’d seen throughout the day-time, mixed with his powerful asthma medication created a sleep-walking, sexual Frankenstein of terrifying proportions. FYI I spent the second night in the lift.

6. Dead Zebras/Expert Begging – It’s not every-day you see a dead Zebra and a man lying face down in the same street is it? I didn’t know who to feel sorrier for.

7. Choked with laughter – Having been awake for nearly 24 hours and high on fashion/vin rouge it’s perhaps no surprise that I nearly died laughing during a meal-time joke I made about Lenny Henry with the chaps from Tres Bien, Our Legacy and Oi Polloi. You really had to be there/English to appreciate it though. Note Glenn and Patrick at the end of the table still coming down off the punchline a good ten minutes later.

8. The flea markets – Being the culture vultures that we are we also decided to hit ‘les puces’ we saw some proper cool shit and we even bought some of it too.

9. Meeting a ‘Soixante-huitard’ – Speaking of buying stuff, whilst in the flea market we went on a search for Mai 68 posters. Where not only did we get hold of some absolute corkers but we also met someone who was actually there. A lovely, sweet-natured lady who looked like a dead nice mum. ‘Did you throw stones at the police?’ I asked in pidgin French. ‘Oui’ she replied demurely, like I’d just asked her if she took sugar in her brew.

10. Oh yeah the clothes and that – I suppose I should mention the clothes shouldn’t I? We met some ace people at the shows including fellow Brits Ian Paley and David Keyte and saw some top notch gear. Though there was loads of mint/expensive stuff that I’d have given my right arm for. The one thing that caught my eye every time I passed it was a Penfield jacket that looks like the sort of thing a Mexican candy-floss dealer would wear. I’m well getting one when they come out this Autumn.