Badaude

Badaude's Paris Address Book - David Mallett Hair

After a year and a few experiments, it seems I'm now committed to short. I see all these girls walking round with great long hair and they look wonderful but I'm beginning to regard them as a different species.

 

The great thing about short hair is, I no longer own a comb. At least, I do, but I last saw it about April. The less good thing is, you have to spend more on haircuts. But not this much, at least, not often...

 

As as I step through the door of David Mallett’s by-appointment-only salon, I am greeted a six foot ex-model/receptionist of extraordinary beauty. It’s a bit of a shock but, after I’ve been there for half and hour, I start to figure she can’t help it. After all, everything else in the salon is beautiful.

 

David Mallett has been cutting hair since he was 16. 'I love my work,' he tells me. 'Whenever I go on holiday, I get itchy fingers.' He moved to this high-ceilinged Hausmannian townhouse in order to create an ‘anti-salon’ after his international celebrity clients decided they all preferred having their hair cut at his apartment rather then his workplace.

 

And the salon is like a very tasteful apartment: all calm, mushroom-coloured walls with 19th century mouldings picked out in cream. Each hairdressing station is a little antique table in front of a floor-to-ceiling mirror which reflects the light from the tall windows. Just to take the conventional salon-busting a little further, there’s also Babette, a nine-foot tall stuffed ostrich standing imperiously in the middle of the room, occasionally losing her dignity when her tail-feathers are impishly ruffled by a blast from David’s hairdryer.

 

 

Like all good hairdressers, David’s a a ‘hair-whisperer’, adept at persuading

nervous clients into a new cut.

 

And he has a theory. 

 

'I think there are cut people and there are blow-dry people. For some clients with long hair, it’s all about the blow-dry but, for you, I’m going to do a cut. It will be very simple. Easy to maintain. Because you have fine hair, you don’t want to do too much with it.' (I suspect this is a nice way of saying I don't look like I have the money to be high-maintenance). 

 

A couple of weeks later, I find that he’s right. Despite any differences in lifestyle between me and some of his more fabulous clients, my hair is looking good without blow-drying, and getting me plenty of compliments. This is without doubt the best haircut I've had. Ever.

 

I ask him who he’s worked with. 'Sharon Stone, Natalie Portman, when they’re in Paris. I’m just going over to London to do a shoot with model Saffron and photographer, Miles Aldridge.' What about the French? 'Oh, lots of actresses. Isabelle Huppert. I think you look a little Huppertian. Elle a un coté Huppertian?' He asks Laurent, the resident manicurist, 'Huppert-ian?' he asks. 'Can you say that?'

 

I look like Isabelle Huppert? I’m sold. I’ll have what she’s having...

 

Cuts from 100 Euros, 150 Euros with David.

14 Rue Notre-Dame des Victoires, 75002 Paris
+33 1 40 20 00 23

www.david-mallett.com

I'm dreaming of a Badaude Christmas, Hanukkah, Winter Solstice etc...

Tis the season, and I've decided to offer a cut-price Giclee print to readers of two of my best pieces of 2009.

I'm selling a limited edition of "Paris Girls" and "London Girls" at the bargain price of £55 each (or £100 for two) + £5 UK p&p or £10 p&p worldwide. They are printed on archive quality acid-free paper with pigment inks guaranteed to last a minimum of 200 years (how they know that, I don't know) so long as you don't do anything silly like hanging them in bright direct sunlight for a really long time.

The printed area measures 26.5 x 21.5cm and is printed on an A3 (29 x 42cm) sheet for you to trim as you like.

Each print is part of a limited edition of 25 and is signed and numbered by the artist (that's me).

You can pay me by Paypal or UK cheque. If you'd like one or both prints, email me (hit the button at the top right of my blog) with your delivery details. I'll send you an invoice with payment details and I'll ship your print to you within 24 hours of Paypal/cheque clearing. European orders should arrive within a week. Further afield may take a little longer. I ship by signed-for insured delivery packed either flat in a sturdy card envelope or rolled in a tube, both protected by acid-free tissue.

I usually sell prints at exhibition for £90,so choose your nationality of girl and revel in a bargain! PLUS! (read on under next pic)...

 
WIN A PRINT! I'm giving away a copy of either "London Girls" or "Paris Girls" (you choose) to someone who leaves a comment in the box below! What should it be about? Ermm, how about something appropriately seasonal (about London, Paris, fashion, any Winter festival, the weather...). The winner will be picked at midnight on 6th December!

Packing for Paris

Packing for Paris can be a tricky business, so tricky that Michelle who runs the delightful PrettyMommy asked me about it.

 

There are a few things to take into account, but only one of them is truly important (two if you count the umbrella).

 

How long will I be staying? How much do I want/will my method of transport allow me to carry? What will the weather be like? What will I be doing? These are important, sure, but successful packing for any destination is as much about the dream as the reality, and planning can be a satisfying mental mini-break. So, for Paris, take only the clothes you can imagine yourself wearing as you walk through the Tuilleries, cross the Pont Neuf, or sit in Café de Flore (so long as you also remember to take the umbrella...).

 

A confession: wherever I go, I underpack rather than overpack, imagining that I can survive with a toothbrush and a Chanel lipstick (no. 64 - Enthusiast, if you want to know). I'm not familiar with the evils of overpacking but underpacking isn't too good when all too often I end up with nothing but paint-stained overalls and a pair of stilettos. However, here are the current contents of my London-Paris overnight bag.

 

Pants - See by Chloe, Sweater - A.P.C. , Jacket - Vanessa Bruno, Patent lace-ups with a small heel - B Store, APC coat , Herve Chapelier Bag, Repettos

 

(This season's Sonia Rykiel's show included models speaking the designer's fantasies about dressing for Paris. I especially liked, "Je m'appelle Betty, je viens du fin fond du Colorado pour m'acheter une robe noire a Paris". Betty and Sonia know Paris is a city that requires some dressing up for. Please add your real - or fantasy - list below)

The Bomb

What's almost good as being asked to draw on the walls of immortal bookshop, Shakespeare & Company? Maybe being interviewed about it by immortal arts mag, Bomb.

I was flattered to be questioned by the human embodiment of the digital arm of the 28-year-old publication that artist Betsy Sussler founded asking, "Wouldn't it be great if we started a magazine where we talked about the artwork the way we talk about it among ourselves?"

Bomb's Digital Editor, Paul Morris, took some photos and asked me questions such as:

 

Paul Morris: Your illustrations are an interesting fusion of image and text. How does your experience as an artist inform your appreciation for literature in general, and for literary figures in particular?

and

PM: What kind of research did you have to do in selecting your subjects? And when you finally had your list of writers sorted out, what was your approach to locating the right archival image of to use as source material?

and

Paul Morris: BOMB readers are most interested in the creative process: how artists and writers think and talk about their own work is of primary concern to us. What can you tell us about your own process, and your progress, as your style has evolved?

Want to know what I answered?

read on at Bomb...

Badaude's Paris Address Book - Ladurée

Why haven't I reviewed Ladurée before? Surely everyone's been there? Well, not me. Until last week.

 

This is the place where Ladies who Lunch lunch in Paris. Ladurée is well-known as the home of the most famous macarons in Paris. Macarons are nothing like 'macaroons' and hardly a visitor goes home without one of their little duck-egg-blue patisserie boxes. Where we see a fairly dry tea biscuit, the French see high art. A Ladurée macaron is two light, meringue-y cakes stuck together with a layer of creamy goo, and it comes in any flavour from caramel au beurre salé (salty butter-caramel) to citron-basilic (lime/basil). Some of them taste as powdery as they look: violette is like perfume, almost like eating your own lipstick. But then Ladurée did produce a range of lipgloss for Sephora. And somehow I love food that tastes a little like non-food. For the full effect, choose a plateful of the mini-versions from the counter downstairs.

 

 

Head upstairs to the shady tearoom on the upper floor and, after your decadent Ladurée signature club sandwich with foie gras, your waitress will bring up your little plate of heaven along with your pot of Oolong.

 

Favourite flavours below, please!

 

...Or imaginary flavours (I recently read an interview with Laduree's chief patissier in which he said he dreamt of creating a carrot-hazlenut macaron. He also gave a basic recipe and I actually had a go at making macarons at home, with surprising, though not completely elegant, success).

 

www.laduree.fr

21, rue Bonaparte, 75006, Métro: St Germain, tel : 01.44.07.64.87

The Oxford Murders

A month ago I was at a party in Paris when I first met Todd Zuniga of Opium Magazine who also runs Literary Death Match. Being English, I made the unguarded comment, 'You should do that in Oxford. Everyone there's a writer.' Being American, he replied, terrifyingly, 'Sure - how about the first week in November?'.

Luckily I know Xander Cansell, Oxford's literary Mr Fix. Despite a slow start persuading people to be involved (might have been something to do with the word 'death' in the title*?) we ended up with a fine line-up including judges: multi-award winning poet and writer, Kate Clanchy; Idler editor, Dan Kieran and last-minute (I mean literarlly 30 minutes before) replacement for Tom Greeves, Ben Walker, who was not only lanconically hilarious but improvised on his guitar to order.

Reading were the fabulous Jake Wallis-Simons, Miranda Ward, Megan Kerr and LDM champion, George Chopping ('the love child of Hugh Grant and John Hegley' - Kate Clanchy). Here he is:

The pen is mightier than the sword. Those who live by the pen, die by the pen (or perhaps by a particularly savage game of musical chairs...).

Oh yes, and I did some live drawing...

 
  
 
(Poster and bad photo by me. Good photos by Garrett Coakley)

*No living authors were harmed during the making of this event.

Suddenly Hiver

Last week, the season turned in Paris. The trees are skeletons. 'Grog chaud' is suddenly chalked up on all the menu boards in the Tuilleries' cafes. Time for a change of clothes.

I finally took the plunge and bought some stupid trousers. These are See by Chloe. The sweater's A.P.C., the scarf last season's Isabel Marant and the jacket, this season's Vanessa Bruno and my patent lace-ups by B-store - about a year old but this is the first outfit I felt was 'right' with them.

(Incidentally, what exactly is 'Grog Chaud'?)

Hemingway & Company (Plus Big Badaude Giveaway!)

Crazy week at Shakespeare & co.So what was it like? Well, most days went a little like this:

Morning, walk to work past Notre Dame, gleaming. Arrive - tumbleweeds everywhere: unswept, unslept. Giro Playboy in the bathroom ('Would you like a coffee? A glass of wine?' 'A coffee.')

Corinne sawing shelves, tatooed, silent mostly. ('My right arm is dedicated to Alice in Wonderland, my left...')

Intruder:'Cela n'est pas un metier des femmes.'

Sylvia (in yellow boots) 'Mais ca change, ca change.' 

Maitresse in refuge from a bad smell, working in the corner. Me, working up a ladder, pen in mouth, a Groucho Marx cigar. Booktourists arrive, documentarymaker arrives: my ass photographed from 100 angles.

Michael: 'A glass of wine? Anytime. A coffee? A coffee. Got to keep the balance.'

I draw through lunch.

Balanced on the benches, one foot in the door to George Whitman's apartment, I catch a whiff of WIFI from the office.

Syliva's amythyst necklace: Maitresse's amythyst necklace.

After hours: still working. Lauren shelves books, Gemma and Gemma shelve books. Sylvia shelves books.

Magazine editors arrive, photograph the walls. I notice - books in George Whitman's library: 'Naked They Prayed' (snortle); another. What was that title? Can't remember - but worse! (giggle). Third, a book by Arnold Bennet labelled in equal capitals BURIED ALIVE BY ARNOLD BENNET (barely-repressed hysteria). 

Half an hour on the phone. Coquette, Maitresse, Badaude (salonistes? superheroes?) wait to leave. Am I finished? Coquette tells a sale story: where should we meet, eat? Ici ou ailleurs? Ici ou ailleurs?

'A glass of wine? A coffee? Just ask me. Any time.'

(It was always wine, never coffee).

I've finished drawing. I write on the wall of Shakespeare & Company:'My Latin quarter hat. God, we simply must dress the character. I want puce gloves. You were a student, weren't you? Of what in the other devil's name? Paysayenn. P. C. N., you know: physiques, chimiques et naturelles. Aha. Eating your groatsworth of mou en civet, fleshpots of Egypt, elbowed by belching cabmen. Just say in the most natural tone: when I was in Paris, boul' Mich', I used to. Yes, used to carry punched tickets to prove an alibi if they arrested you for murder somewhere. Justice. On the night of the seventeenth of February 1904 the prisoner was seen by two witnesses. Other fellow did it: other me. Hat, tie, overcoat, nose. Lui, c'est moi. You seem to have enjoyed yourself.'

(BIG BADAUDE GIVEAWAY! The first person to identify this quote in my comments box, leaving an email contact, will WIN AN ORIGINAL BADAUDE DRAWING!)

Getting there...

 

Beautiful Strangers*

Wednesday last week (28th). Things are shaping up at Shakespeare & Co...

 

...and at the Centre Nationale du Livre where I, along with Maitresse and Meg Zimbeck, I attended a bilingual q&a session organised by the French-American foundation, featuring Todd Zuniga of Opium, Paul Morris of Bomb, Chad Post of Open Letter, Eli Horowitz of McSweeney's as well as high-powereds from the world of traditional publishing. After hours, Ms Zimbeck led all of the above over the river to a little place she just happened to know which was still open and conjured wine, bread, terrines, saucisson and cheese for something approaching 20 and let us stay 'til some sort of late hour...

But it's back to work again in the morning...

(*the title is because I got confused by picking up a leaflet about les belles etrangeres in the lobby of the Maison des Livres. Nevertheless, all the stranger I saw tonight couldn't have been more beautiful)