Here’s where to find it.
1. The covered passages most couples walk straight past
Paris has about twenty surviving passages couverts — 19th-century glass-roofed arcades built so that wealthy Parisians could shop without walking in the mud and rain. Around 150 existed at their peak. Most were demolished when department stores arrived and made them irrelevant. The ones that survived had something worth keeping — a theatre, a wax museum, a wine shop that refused to close, floors too beautiful to tear up.
For a couple, the best thing about them is how flexible they are. No ticket, no booking, no agenda. Glass roof, weather irrelevant. You walk in off a busy boulevard through what looks like an unremarkable doorway, and suddenly you’re in 1850. That transition is the whole experience.
I once walked into one looking for nothing and ended up in a toy shop full of wooden things. There was a little wooden dog on wheels at the end of a string that was too cute not to take home. That was Passage Jouffroy — the narrowest of the passages, the first one built entirely in iron and glass, a wax museum at one end and
Three of the best connect to each other — Passage des Panoramas, Passage Verdeau and Passage Jouffroy — so you can walk through all three without going back outside. Start at Verdeau for the antiques and old books, work through Jouffroy, end at Panoramas — the oldest surviving one, built in 1799, now full of restaurants, vintage stamp shops and a wine bar.
Add Galerie Vivienne nearby if you want the most beautiful one — mosaic floors, grand glass ceiling, a bistro at the end where someone once got engaged over champagne.
Rainy day, sunny day, Tuesday in November. Doesn’t matter. That’s the point.
2. Wine, a board, and nowhere to be
When my husband and I can’t decide what to do for date night, we default to this: find a small wine bar, order a charcuterie and
Traditionally in France, a charcuterie board — or planche apéro — is something you eat before dinner, not instead of it. That’s changing. More and more small wine bars and caves à manger serve boards large enough to share between two or three people, usually with a choice of small or large. Order the large, add a salad, and take your time. You’re not rushing anywhere.
What you’re looking for is a small cave à manger — a wine bar that serves food — where the atmosphere is convivial but not too loud and nobody minds if you sit there for two hours over one bottle. To find one near wherever you’re staying, search “cave à manger Paris” or “planche apéro Paris” on Google Maps. Both will return the right kind of place.
In the 9th, Monbleu does cheese and charcuterie as a proper meal in a small, warm space that doesn’t feel like it was designed for tourists. Worth bookmarking as a starting point.
If you’d rather have someone guide you through the wine while you eat — pairings explained, the history of French wine and cheese as part of the evening — the guided tasting below is worth considering. 5 stars, 214 reviews, 97% of English speakers gave it a perfect score. At 70€ a person, it’s not cheap. But then neither is Paris.
For everything you need to know about charcuterie boards before you order one, this guide has you covered.
3. The oldest sweet shop in Paris — open since 1761
I walked in and felt like I’d been transported. The wooden shelves, the green frontage, the gold lettering, the candied fruit stacked in the window. It’s the kind of shop that makes you lower your voice without knowing why.
À la Mère de Famille has been open since 1761. The interior hasn’t changed much, and neither has the business — chocolates, pralines, caramels, candied fruit, staff who know the products and will let you taste before you buy.
Don’t grab a pre-packed box. They look better than they taste. Buy a few carefully chosen pieces, let the staff guide you, and take them back to your hotel later.
As for the occasional complaint about rushed service, this is Paris. It’s practically a cliché.
Flagship shop: 35 rue du Faubourg Montmartre, 75009. La Mère de Famille
4. The cigar shop Casanova visited
My husband wanted a cigar to go with his cognac after dinner. I didn’t expect much — a shop is a shop. But À la Civette is not that kind of shop.
It’s been open since 1716, tucked around the corner from the Louvre, wooden and narrow and smelling of fine tobacco. Casanova came here. So did Benjamin Franklin and Edgar Degas. The walk-in humidor has over 300 cigars. The staff chat you up like old friends and don’t rush you toward anything.
We spent maybe thirty minutes in there, which sounds like nothing and felt like an hour in the good way. Picked out a cigar together, walked to a nearby café, and that was it — one of those Paris moments that cost almost nothing.
Located at 157 Rue Saint-Honoré.
5. Get lost inside a painting at Atelier des Lumières
Instead of paintings on walls, the artwork is projected onto every surface of a giant room — floor, ceiling, walls, all of it. The images move and shift to music. Van Gogh’s brushstrokes sweep across the floor under your feet. Klimt’s gold spirals climb the walls above your head. You’re not looking at art. You’re standing in it.
The building itself has a story. Built in 1835 by two brothers from a family of ploughmen, they made cast iron parts for the French navy and railways. Four generations, a hundred years, then the Great Depression finished them off, and the building sat empty for decades. Now it’s this.
A friend came back from here and couldn’t quite explain it, which is usually a good sign.
It’s standing room, so wear shoes you can live in for two hours. Book ahead — this one sells out. Go on Friday or Saturday evening when they run late. You’ll walk out into the Paris night feeling like something shifted, and spend the rest of the evening trying to explain it to each other over wine.
6. A private photo session in Paris
That photo of me kissing my husband in front of the
Getting good photos in Paris is harder than it looks. The light is right for about forty minutes, everyone else is trying to do the same thing, and “hold the phone higher” only gets you so far.
For something more personal than a selfie and less stressful than a DIY production, Airbnb Experiences is worth browsing — local hosts offering everything from intimate city walks to creative sessions, the kind of thing that turns a Paris trip into something you actually remember.
7. Paint your partner in a Paris atelier
The portrait will either look weirdly flattering or like it’s been through a minor emotional crisis. You won’t know which until it’s done.
You sit across from each other and try to paint what you see. Two hours of quietly realising your beloved has a much larger nose than you remembered, one eyebrow has taken on a life of its own, and the left eye has wandered off in a completely different direction.
A local artist guides the session. Materials included. No experience necessary.
From 44€ per person • Saturdays only — book ahead • English and French available • Latin Quarter, 5th arrondissement — nearest metro Cluny–La Sorbonne (line 10)
8. Learn to make croissants in a Paris kitchen
Living in France means I have access to a fresh croissant whenever I want. I know how lucky that is. Most people visit Paris, eat the best croissant of their life, and spend the next year trying to find something half as good back home. This workshop fixes that.
Both options teach you the real technique — the lamination, the folding, the butter layers that make the whole thing work. You leave with the recipe and the confidence to recreate that Paris breakfast at home whenever you want. The choice is really about the atmosphere you want around it.
The Emily in Paris themed workshop, if you want the fun, colourful croissants, a Polaroid, lavender and raspberry flavours, and a branded box to take home. The Maison Fleuret version, if you want the classic experience — no theme, just a proper French kitchen and a croissant made the right way.
Either way, you’ll eat the best croissant of your trip, standing in a Paris kitchen with flour on your hands. Worse ways to spend a morning.
9. A French-style apéro picnic by the Seine or at the foot of the Eiffel Tower
The first time I walked along the Seine and saw people just sitting on the riverbank with a full bottle of wine, a baguette torn in half, and what looked like a supermarket salad between them, I didn’t know what I was looking at. No table, no restaurant, no occasion. Just food, the river, and nowhere else to be. That was before I understood apéro culture.
This is what Parisians actually do — not a tourist version. On warm evenings, you’ll find them along the quais of the Seine, or spread out on the Champ de Mars — the long stretch of grass directly in front of the
The DIY version is easier than it sounds. Any boulangerie will put together a bag — sandwich, quiche, pastry, whatever they have that day. Add cheese and charcuterie from a fromagerie or the nearest supermarket. Wine from a cave à vins. Plastic cups are fine and entirely Parisian — nobody judges. If you want glasses, pick up two cheap ones from a Monoprix for a euro each and leave them behind when you go. A guide to French grocery stores if you need it.
If you’d rather skip the assembly, a pre-made gourmet
Best spots: Champ de Mars for the
10. A salon de thé that starts an argument
One of you wants somewhere cosy and slightly bookish. The other wants somewhere with pastries that look like they belong in an opera. This argument has no wrong answer. Paris has both.
Smith & Son — the largest English bookshop in Paris, on Rue de Rivoli since 1870. The café is upstairs, above the shelves, with views over the Tuileries Gardens. Scones, clotted cream, Earl Grey, the smell of books. You’ll lose an hour before you notice it’s gone. Good if one of you is slightly homesick, or just wants to read something in English for a while without feeling like a tourist.
Smith & Son — 248 Rue de Rivoli, 75001. Metro Concorde. Closed Mondays.
Violetta et Alfredo — named after the two leads of La Traviata. The owner built it in homage to Marie Duplessis, the real Parisian courtesan who inspired the novel that inspired the opera. Her apartment was around the corner from where you’re sitting. The pastries are made on-site. They look like act two of an opera and taste better than that sounds.
Good if one of you needs to be won over with something beautiful on a plate.
Violetta et Alfredo — open every day 10h–19h. 9th arrondissement.
11. The official Emily in Paris filming locations tour
My friends scoff at Emily in Paris. Part of me agrees with them. But if you watched it and spent half the time trying to identify the streets behind her, this tour is for you. The official filming locations tour covers the actual spots used in the series — not a knockoff walking tour that passes by adjacent streets, but the real locations, 2.5 hours, guided.
It works as a romantic activity because Paris looks exactly like it does in the show — clean streets, perfect light, nobody sweating on the metro — and walking through it with someone who also watched all four seasons is its own kind of pleasure. The Palais Garnier shows up on the route, which means you get the opera house without having to sit through an actual opera.
4.9 stars, 428 reviews, from 45€ per person.
Book the official Emily in Paris filming locations tour on GetYourGuide
The Paris most tourists come to see is not the Paris Parisians actually live in. Locals don’t queue for the
