A Little Light Shopping .... in Buenos Aires

O.K.  Blogger weirdness remedied for the moment.  We have pictures!  No Corner View tho' this week.   Because it's such a busy moment.  Much sewing, spring cleaning and home front spruce-up going on!  Want to get this all out of the way so I can enjoy the rest of my summer!  Hope you like this one!  I'll be a late over to visit your Corner Views but I look forward to seeing what's on your walls!    P.S. I'm preparing a June giveaway for the week to come so do please check back!

Lest I give the impression that Buenos Aires is lost in some economically depressed time warp where the 21st c. sun never shines.......

Here, a few little snapshots of things that made me smile, made me interested, or which I thought seemed

(Humawaca, for stylish and colorful leather)

very particular to Argentina.  REALLY I would LOVE to go there again.  And spend alot of time exploring, and taking in the atmosphere and the culture.

There is the gaucho/cowboy aspect of it, the Andean rugged outdoors, ancient Incan/Arawak cultural aspect, all mixed into this Italian/Spanish/English/French 19th century identity.  That makes for a very interesting mix.  It may be too European - as Francesca remarked here - for Europeans, compared to the rest of the continent....

(Taina, avenida Ayacucho)

But for us North Americans, kind of a revelation.  That something so European, so beautifully wrought

(by legions of European laborers and African slaves) can still exist in our hemisphere, and that an American country can embrace at the same time, the native culture of the region.  These both, that we in the United States of........ have so emphatically mowed over or erased in their authentic forms from our mainstream landscape.

(Tupperware!)

There are not many chain stores in Buenos Aires - of the kind that you would recognize from most shopping malls in the U.S., Europe, and Asia.  Which is much of its charm.  I don't even think I've EVER seen a Tupperware store in America.  Though this glitzy one has made a bet on Buenos Aires.

The 21st century does percolate and thrive here, in wonderfully imaginative and sweetly executed retail displays AND overheated prices.

(Shynka)

There are people here too, who want to ride in style with flower vases on their dashboards.

Many would still rather dress like Audrey Hepburn in "Love in the Afternoon".  (Than Paris Hilton.) Which pleases me.

And someone has decided, of course, that there are Argentinians who desire to furnish their homes in that hopelessly and irresistibly tasteful galvanized, greige, garden-ey style ..........

(A place called "Paul" - Palermo Soho - which did not welcome photo taking of their goods.)

.........that has made conquest of the female consciousness from Melbourne to Menton.

(Mr. Paradis has promised to build me this bench after my cheapo wicker one from Pier One dies.  Erego, Paul's no-picture policy?)

(Have we had enough ideas for succulent centerpieces out of this blog for this week?)

If Mr. Paradis had perhaps been less "with me" during our sojourn, there might have been more shopping bags accompanying us home ...... I am sad and sorry to say, that I came home from Buenos Aires with change in my pocket.  (Do you shop less when you are with that special someone?)  

And my only souvenirs being these photos.  (No, no milagros, no.)

I should have contributed more meaningfully to their economy!!!!!!  But apparently I found it impossible to choose - and that I.......... needed more time!  

NEXT BUENOS AIRES POST:  Vintage shopping!  (You'll soon see why I needed a LIFETIME - to shop properly in B.A.)