La Parisienne
La Parisienne 23/18/2020
May 3, 2020
‘Cabin crew please be seated for landing. Flight BA-147 is descending towards Charles De Gaulle.’
Both my excitement and perspiration knew no bounds. My Parisienne dream was coming true. Stumbling, bumbling and bumping around into people with my huge suitcases, I made it to the exit or soon to be affectionately called Sortie.
I got into a cab and requested the driver to take me to Champs Élysées. To my bewilderment, it wasn’t pronounced as it was spelled! “Ah! shahn zey-lee-zey you mean?”, he said. Oui.
”Le sigh !” Paris, je viens!
My hopeful, fascinated and awestruck eyes glazed over the buildings laced with picturesque wrought-iron balconies, the tiny cafés with a pretty shed, a wide array of French delicacies, ah the quintessential croissant, and the women even more breathtakingly beautiful — as if they had just strutted off of a catalog shoot out of the pages of Vogue Paris. I had been astounded by French beauty long before I began my downward descent into Paris, but this brush with reality further fueled my infatuation.
A crisp red lip, radiant skin, the tousled hair, the rough, smudgy and raw eyeliner. Très chic! It's impossible not to marvel at French beauty. They have it all figured out between the perfect natural wavy hair, the no-makeup makeup look that just works wonders, and the general understated and subtle glamour that seems to come naturally to them or more fashionably - je ne sais quoi!
The French woman wears her beauty effortlessly like armor. French beauty is an attitude. A tale of self-confidence, individuality, authenticity and not perfection. Beauty resides in those crevices of societally deemed imperfections. Your scars are your shield; embrace them, accept them, flaunt them and love them.
But where did It all begin?
“Hard times arouse an instinctive desire for authenticity.”
My intimate tryst with the city of lights helped me discover that the seeds of liberation of the French woman were sowed centuries ago by women who were far ahead of their times, staring adversity right in its face without flinching while paving the way for women’s emancipation. While France was redefining freedom through French revolution, women in that era were crafting a revolution of their own which would transform the meaning of womanhood in the times to come.
The landscape of the liberated French woman is painted with the sacrifice of women like Olympe de Gouge, the torchbearer of women’s rights in the 18th century, who believed, “Regardless of what barriers confront you, it is in your own to free yourselves, you have only to want to.”
This tale of unapologetic individuality is laced with the rebellion of women like Elizabeth Vigiée-Lebrun and Coco Chanel and who turned their rebellion into art and elegance into refusal - refusal to be confined, defined or suppressed by societal conventions. They believed that desire fuels the sense of self. Thereby, no woman ever should have to give up on her desire to be who she wanted to be - “I decide who I want to be, and that is who I am.”
This poetic resurgence of femininity is enameled by the petitions of women like Simone Veil, French lawyer and politician who fought for women to have the right to abortion, and many other women who paved the path for the empowered French woman of today.
While everyone is so fascinated with what meets the eye, they remain unacquainted with the world of wisdom that lies beneath that beauty. Underneath the raw and authentic french beauty visual, you shall uncover a woman that is self-aware, confident, well-read, cultured, educated, resilient, driven and proud. She is always growing, learning and metamorphing. She has her own strong opinion, be it politics, socio-economic landscapes, music, art, culture or food. She is constantly learning from her environment, surroundings and experiences. What we might think is the perfect amount of tousle in her hair, might actually just be years of owning who she is!
Well, let’s talk about appearances. French women believe beauty without expression is boring. Their outer appearance is a canvas to paint the inner story of their being. Women here emphasize their differences, beauty, personality and style-wise. They like their individuality. Commitment to self shows in their beauty. There is an underlying sense of pleasure in everything they do – skincare, riding a bike, baking, visiting a museum, playing an instrument, picking grapes, teaching, working, debating or challenging norms because the elegance that comes from within shines the brightest.
No quick fixes are ever a part of anything eternally beautiful. Major revolutions, such as this one, have taken centuries. Discovering yourself, learning to be your best self and to nurture that takes time, and nobody here is in a rush!
The French woman of today still values the sacrifices of all the wonderful women who were once the wind beneath their wings and continue to conquer and constantly reclaim their freedom, every single day. She nurtures and grows her freedom and passes on the baton for everyone else to follow suit.
It brings us to a fundamental question every woman has constantly struggled with - Why should women have to make hard choices about who they want to be, what they should do and what they should look like?
Well, we don’t have to. Emancipation does not mean parting ways with traditions, elegance and femininity, it merely means redefining it. Always choose ‘And’ over ‘Or’, like the classic French woman.
They choose to be fragile and bold, vulnerable and invincible, fierce and dainty, naked and concealed, conventional and edgy, sexually liberated and demure.
To the woman of today - let instinct and self-expression be your guide. There is only one thing more important than self-discovery; Rediscovery. Every single time you will look inwards, you find something about yourself that is brand new and that, right there, shall be the inception of a new love affair.
- The Essènci team -