The coolest water fountain in all of Paris has to be the one in Place St Sulpice in St Germain.
Three lovely ladies carry a roof from which a stream of water falls. Perfect for water bottles as seen in the first photo of a bike rider.
Surprises around every corner!
Aren't the lovely ladies kind to work so tirelessly? Fountains like this are dispersed throughout Paris in fact. They were installed by an English philantropist/collector named Wallace to provide drinking water for all. There is also one in New Orleans in Decateur Street!
ReplyDeleteI had no idea, thanks matiere! I'm going to have to look that up online for some more history -fascinating! I wonder now if I saw more of these fountains and didn't realize.
ReplyDeleteThats a water fountain? Wow! Nothing like the ones we used to have in elementary school.
ReplyDeletexx,
Samantha
Water sprites! Richard Wallace wanted to provide the poor and homeless with a source of water since the price of water had increased and the temptation was to turn to liquor. Apparently there are still 66 of these water fountains around paris!
ReplyDeleteGreat images Stefan. I remembered seeing these but never realized they were water fountains. I'm glad you posted this. I'm also appreciative of the information about these fountains shared by your visitors. This Richard Wallace was apparently a caring individual.
ReplyDeleteyes, Julio -thanks to C and Matiere! I'm a big history geek about stuff like this -i can't wait to look up more information on Wallace tonight!
ReplyDeleteI do love a fellow history geek and Your eye for catching the beauty of EVERYTHING, and not just the obvious. I hope you sketched while there! GT
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing this! The "fishscale" motif design is very similar to the Domes at the Basilica Sacre Coeur/ limestone domes.
ReplyDeleteThere is nothing like a good fish scale pattern (:
Lenore
The Parisians have another version. They believe a tramp sold the fountains to a naive American visitor, a certain Mister Wallace.
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