If you are in Lille or somewhere in the northern area of France and you are looking for something to do today, head out to the annual Lille’s Marché des Modes.

A number of local fashion brands are showing their talents where you can buy good quality accessories and other fashionable stuff at reasonable price. Who knows, there must be some future Karl or Marc or Coco here at the Marché des Modes de Lille!

Have a nice and relaxing Sunday lovelies

Delicious dessert le merveilleux by Aux Merveilleux de Fred

Just want to wish everyone a very productive and joyful week ahead!

P/S : keep in touch with me on my twitter, pinterest, instagram and myfavoritelist’s facebook page

Enjoy the photos!

Damn I miss bretzels so much!

Till next post, bisoux!

Filed under: Architecture, Travel ]]> http://myfavoritelist.wordpress.com/2013/04/24/braunschweig-city-center/feed/ 0 Braunschweig City Center annyasin Braunschweig City Center Braunschweig Braunschweig Bibliothek Braunschweig Burgplatz Braunschweig Burgplatz Braunschweig Braunschweig SONY DSC SONY DSC Tom Fecht Braunschweig http://myfavoritelist.wordpress.com/2013/04/15/happy-rizzi-house-braunschweig/ http://myfavoritelist.wordpress.com/2013/04/15/happy-rizzi-house-braunschweig/#comments Mon, 15 Apr 2013 20:59:44 +0000 annyasin http://myfavoritelist.wordpress.com/?p=1080 Continue reading »]]> During my promenade in Braunschweig the next day after the New Yorker Challenge, my team and I stumbled upon this very intriguing building.

This building is called Happy Rizzi House and actually is an office building designed by the American Pop Art artist, James Rizzi.

The building has a multitude colours and shapes and it definitely stands out amidst other more classical-style building in the area.

The building really brings the “happy” touch to the area, an excellent surprise indeed during my visit to Braunschweig.

Till then, have a good week!

Malacca is one of the 13 states of Malaysia and it is located in the southern region. This region played a very important role in the construction of the Malay sultanate which later gave birth to Federation of Malaya and then Malaysia (when the two states in Borneo joins the federation).

The sultanate ended when the Portuguese colonized the city. Malacca was a great port where the trades were being held from all over Asia, so having the city under your power means you can rule the whole region at that time. This city also went under other foreign controls and all of this events left a very rich historical traces in the city.

One of the most popular historical attraction in this town is the A Famosa. It is a Portuguese fortress that was built by the Portuguese general and statesman, Alfonso de Albuquerque who was the head of the Malacca’s attack. The fortress was used to protect the city from the sultanate’s army as they were trying to get the city back.

A Famosa was taken by the Dutch when they took Malacca from the Portuguese. It was then handed to the British and they wanted to destroy the fortress. The action was then stopped by the Sir Stamford Raffles, the founder of Singapore for the sake of historical heritage.

Malacca was named as one of the UNESCO Heritage site in 2008 for its unique architectural and cultural townscape. If you are planning to visit it one day, I can guarantee that you will fall in love with the city and it’s heritage.

See you in the next post with more photos of Malacca!

Firstly opened in the town of Flensburg in 1971, New Yorker has now 968 stores in 38 countries such as in France, Poland, Portugal, Finland as well as Saudi Arabia and Morocco. The main style of this brand is young, fun and unique. Moreover, they want to inspire their customers to be brave, enjoy their everyday star moment and dress fearlessly.

Our visit started at the New Yorker headquarters in Braunschweig, Germany. There, my team and other participants had the chance to visit the different departments of the company such as marketing, branding and design.  We then did the presentation of our marketing research and delivered our new ideas for products promotion.

Presentation time at New Yorker HQ

We then did a tour at the New Yorker flagstore in Braunschweig. The least that I could say is that the store is a heaven for fashion-lovers and shopping addicts. The building has four floors where they dedicated every floor to different subbrands of New Yorker such as AMISU and Fishbone. The day ended at one of the best steak house in town where we were served plenty delicious dishes and the winner’s team was announced.

My team and I didn’t make to the top 3 presentation but we had a lot of fun learning new things and meeting new people. The New Yorker personnel was very totally adorable and helpful during the entire day. The next day we visited the town but that, I will show you in the next post!

Have a wonderful week ahead everybody!

A short introduction about the great chef might be good here. Born in 1962 in L’Hospitalet de Llobregat, he began his career in the 80′s as a dishwasher. At the young age of 22, he joined the kitchen staff at elBulli and after only 18 months working there, he was promoted as the head chef.

Ferran Adria is often associated to “molecular gastronomy”, a mix of food and science technique that will produce not only pleasurable stuff for your tastebud but also for your eyes.

Situated at Rosas, Catalonia, elBulli won its first Michelin-star in 1976, following by the second star in 1990.  The third Michelin-star came in 1997 and completed elBulli glorious reputation.

It was said that the restaurant had received almost two millions reservation requests even if it can only serve about 8000 per season. Voted five times as the World’s Best Restaurant, elBulli was closed since July 2011 but  is scheduled to re-open in 2014 as a culinary academy.

The exposition covers the history of elBulli with almost 30,000 items from the restaurant’s archive. You can find documents, pictures, sketches, recipe notes, tasting diagrams, menus and videos of the chef and his team.

Picture above : A few examples of sketches by the maestro and a special drawing of Ferran Adria by Matt Groening

Picture below : The hall of fame, pictures of famous guests and clients as well as restaurant staffs

What I love the most are the pictures of the different meal and dishes. Some of them are as simple as soups and salad while others are more elaborated  recipes. All of the photos have two things in common ; they are all eye candy and definitely make you crave for food.

The exhibition ends this weekend and will then tour to London and New York.

Palau Robert
Catalan Information Centre
Passeig de Gràcia, 107 08008 Barcelona

One of  the reasons for us to be excited was because we had booked a very special place in Andorra. Since we took our holiday in autumn (not  during the bustling summer school holidays),  we had the advantage of less pricey hotels and a more peaceful atmosphere.

In Andorra, we unpacked our suitcase at Andorra Park Hotel. This 5-star hotel is situated at Andorra-La-Vella, which is the capital of Andorra.

The hotel is basically made of concrete and metal structure, as well as glass. The architecture of the hotel is definitely in the contrast with the nature that surrounded the hotel.

As soon as you enter the hotel, you can feel the tranquility of the area. The hotel staff were very helpful and they spoke a professional English and French even though the official language of Andorra is Catalan.

Andorra Park Hotel lobby

The room was spacious and you have everything you need, coffee machine, fridge, Wi Fi connection etc. You also have a very well-equipped and comfortable bathroom with both Italian-style shower and hydro-massage bathtub! However, I was  a little disappointed with the room decoration that I found quite conservative and unoriginal.

The major attraction of the room for me was the balcony. With a huge glass door opening, it was like having a moving nature painting in front of your eyes. Waking up in the morning with mountain view was definitely what we were looking for during the short holiday.

Other than the exquisite service and splendid view, Andorra Park Hotel offers a number of other advantages, such as swimming pools, sauna, gym with private instructors and aromatherapy massage with a few extra euros. The hotel is completed with a restaurant (I didn’t try it during night, just breakfast in the morning).

Overall, we really appreciated this hotel and enjoyed our stay very much. I highly suggest it if you are thinking to have a relaxing winter weekend getaway or ski trip (ski stations are merely 20kms away from Andorra La Vella) in the Pyrenees.

Andorra Park Hotel
Les Canals, 24 – AD500 ANDORRA LA VELLA (Andorra)

Website : Andorra Park Hotel

Lille LAM Museum (Lille Metropole Musée d’Art Moderne, d’Art Contemporain et d’Art Brut) is an important museum for 20th and 21st century art in the north area. This museum has more than 4500 pieces of art work and covered three types of collection (Modern Art, Contemporary Art and Art Brut).

The modern art area displays Fauvism, Cubism and other 20th century art works. You can easily get lost in the fascinating painting, sketches and series of work by various artists such as Joan Miro, Fernand Leger and Picasso.

As you walk through the collection, you will arrive at the area where the works of the inventor of Art Brut, Jean Dubuffet are displayed. This introduction to the Art Brut collection brings you next to 6 vast rooms where you can find about 350 works.

Finally, the Contemporary Art collection, brought in 25 years ago is presented where you can find works by Daniel Buren, Annette Messanger and others.

In conjunction with the Lille 3000 festival, the museum is currently organizing a temporary exhibition, La Ville Magique in addition to the permanent collection. This temporary exhibition gather together paintings, collages, photos and films of urban myths of big cities such as Manhattan and Berlin in between the two world wars. Major attractions of this temporary exhibitions include paintings by Georgia O’Keeffe and Brassaï.

The museum itself is an important piece of art where the modern architecture stands out in the middle of the greenery. In 1983, the construction of the museum ended under the eye of its architect Roland Simounet. The museum was then closed again in 2007 in order to establish an extension of the building, this time by architect Manuelle Gautrand, where the future Art Brut collection will be exposed.

The museum is opened Tuesday to Sunday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. (exceptionally closed on 1st January, 1st May and 25th December). Permanent collection entrance fees cost 7€ (5€ reduced prise) and combined ticket with temporary exhibition costs 10€ (7€ reduced price).

LaM 1 allée du Musée
59650 Villeneuve d’Ascq France

The first great weekend plan is the annual “Marché des Mode” (fashion market) in Roubaix.

This annual fashion market is an excellent place to find a unique Christmas present as all the jewelleries, clothes and accessories are specially made by local designers.  You are not only certain to find a one-of-a-kind and memorable Christmas gift, but you are also supporting local talents and economy! What’s not to love, right?

While this winter fashion market might have mostly gifts for girls and women, you might want to have a look at this other cool event where you can find interesting stuff for your men family members , i.e. your son, lovely husband or nephew.

Ankama Fan Fest is a video game festival organized by the Lille-based entertainment company Ankama. Nowadays one of the most successful companies in town, Ankama started as a small video game company in 2001. They have since grown into an extensive brand of animé TV shows, comic books, toys and other merchandises. Furthermore, the three co-founders of the company were actually in the same engineering school as me, giving me another huge reason to be proud of them!

During the Fan Fest, a lot of fun activities will be held such as testing sessions, game tournaments, workshops and expositions. Of course, you can buy their video games and other related products.

Here are the addresses for both events and the website on which you can have a look for more info :

Ankama Fan Fest : Maison Folie Wazemmes, 70 rue des Sarrazins, 59000 Lille

Marché des Modes : avenue Jean Lebas, 59100 Roubaix / 27 rue de l’Espérance, 59100 Roubaix

I’ve told you my plan for this weekend, so now it’s your turn! Tell me yours!

Have a nice weekend, y’all