Josi - General shopping in Paris

I have lived in Paris for 6 months and i understand that it may be difficult to shop in paris if you do not know where to go or if you are there for just the weekend. I must admit it took me a good month to find out where the good shops were!

Buying the tickets:
For starters i would definitely advise you to buy a metro ticket : there are different tickets available such as 1 ticket for 1 journey, a pass of 10 tickets , daily ...
...pass - the passes are called a carte orange and you do need a photo to get it. if you are in paris for just the weekend then i would buy the daily pass for 3 zones (oh yes forgot to mention paris is split into 8 zones or so, but for shopping you only really need the first 3 zones).

Places to go:
Now that you have your tickets the areas to go or metro stops are the following :

Chatelet/les halles: centre of paris ... more

I have lived in Paris for 6 months and i understand that it may be difficult to shop in paris if you do not know where to go or if you are there for just the weekend. I must admit it took me a good month to find out where the good shops were!

Buying the tickets:
For starters i would definitely advise you to buy a metro ticket : there are different tickets available such as 1 ticket for 1 journey, a pass of 10 tickets , daily pass called mobili, a week pass (16€ish) and a months pass - the passes are called a carte orange and you do need a photo to get it. if you are in paris for just the weekend then i would buy the daily pass for 3 zones (oh yes forgot to mention paris is split into 8 zones or so, but for shopping you only really need the first 3 zones).

Places to go:
Now that you have your tickets the areas to go or metro stops are the following :

Chatelet/les halles: centre of paris where you can find a really long street called Rue Rivoli and here you will find all the big shops plus little boutiques. A shopping centre is also built into the station - its a big place ut a maze to go around!

Metro Montparness: This street is calle Rue Montparness where you can find shops such as promod, zara, etam, kookai, sud express, pimkie etc. and lots of boutiques where you can buy shoes for 10€ !!! this was my favourite street!!

Metro Chausee d'Antin Lafayette: Boulevard Hausseman is another street you will want to visit as here is where you can find Galaries Lafayette and printemps - the 2 biggest department stores in Paris. Plus there are a whole choice of other big branded shops. Furthermore outside the department stores you will find little stalls selling cheap useless items - which are quite amusing!!!

Metro La defense: if you are into shopping centres here you will find Les quatres saisons or quatre temps shoppingcentre (ive forgotten what its called but its right outside the metro station). this is a huge shopping centre much like the trafford centre in manchester with a huge vareity of shops for men, women, children - clothes, electricals and a supermarket (Auchan) too. There are 3 floors and a food court!

Metro Galiienni: here you will find another shopping centre a lot smaller than by la defence but it has 2 floors and will fill a couple of hours!

Marie de Montreuil: here is where you can find carrefour and a shopping centre - the area its in however is a bit rough, but very cheap there is an outside market which takes place most days.

Republique: near republique is nice for little shops too (i think it was called rue faubourg)

All in all i really enjoyed my stay in paris and i hope this gives you an idea of where to shop in paris - but i would definitely advise to buy a metro ticket!!! 

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