At the intersection of the ever-chic rue du Bac and rue de Sèvres stands Le Bon Marché, an opulent shopping temple whose elegant architecture matches the luxurious mix of both local and international fashion brands housed within. Founded in 1838 by brothers Paul and Justin Videau, it is where shopping was transformed into an art de vivre.
In 1852, Le Bon Marché was taken over by marketing maverick Aristide Boucicaut and his wife Marguerite who drastically improved the customer experience, creating Paris's first department store, and one of the first modern department stores in the world. Before rich Parisians would shop in the passages couverts (covered passages) to protect them from the city's weather, noise and pollution, while everyone else would go to shops specialized in selling just one thing, and they might not even be allowed to enter to browse around. The Boucicauts introduced a fixed-price system for goods (haggling was still the way of the market at the time) and installed amenities such as a reading room where husbands could wait while their wives shopped. The pair also improved the working conditions of the employees.
Although the eye-watering price tags of the goods for sale are no longer exactly "a good deal" (the store’s name translated into English), to wander Le Bon Marché is to experience the world of historic French luxury – without having to spend a euro. Take the central escalators, which were designed by Andrée Putman with now iconic square panels to mirror the original ceiling above. In fact don’t forget to always look up while you’re browsing around the designer clothes and beauty brands, Gustave Eiffel designed many of the building’s wrought iron ceilings along with architect Louis-Charles Boileau. The Eiffel-designed ceiling in La Librarie, the store’s bookshop, is said to hold more weight in the iron than the capital’s most famous metal monolith, the Eiffel Tower. And don’t forget to stop in at the bathrooms (complete with an old-school powder room) – the Boucicauts were the first to innovate in-store separate sex bathrooms. Now the store continues to innovate with a regular events program for when the store is both open and closed, with out-of-hours events including dance and acrobatic performances in the beauty area.
