The Jetpacker

When was the last time you saw a fashion show at the mall?  Well, at the Galeries Lafayette in Paris, there’s one every day.

Paris is known for high fashion, and the Galeries Lafayette might be the epicenter.  If not the epicenter, it’s in prime time aftershock territory — the waves of the fashion community crash here.

Galeries Lafayette is the largest department store in Europe.  It’s 10 levels of really expensive clothing.  Much like being in art in a museum, you’ll probably be too nervous to touch anything.

That’s okay because there’s other stuff to look at, like the 100-year old stained glass dome ceiling.

During Christmas, Galeries Lafayette boasts the largest indoor Christmas tree of any department store in the world at 60-feet tall.

The mall was suffocatingly packed for the Christmas rush when we were there, so we left not long after arriving.  As soon as we stepped outside, we heard someone yell, “It’s snowing!”  Snow?  Raining from the sky!?  The excitement was so overwhelming that the sounds of the crowd faded out and all I could hear was The Bangles’ “Heaven Is A Place On Earth”.

But this was no heaven.  I quickly pulled my tongue back into my mouth when we discovered that the snow was nothing more than foam shooting out of a machine on the rooftop.  Curse you, Galeries Lafayette, for destroying my hopes and dreams.

Visit their site for hours, store directory and fashion show times.