It is impossible to imagine Paris without its cafés. The city has some 12,000 cafés varying in size, grandeur, and significance. The cafés are like an extension of the French living room, a place to start and end the day, to gossip and debate.
41 The oldest café in Paris is Le Procope. It was opened in 1686 by Francesco Procopio dei Coltelli, the man who turned France into a coffee-drinking society. 42 By the end of the 18th century, all of Paris was intoxicated with coffee and the city supported some 700 cafés. 43 By the 1840s the number of cafés had grown to 3,000. The men who gathered in these cafés and set the theme of the times included journalists, playwrights and writers. Around the turn of the 20th century, the sidewalk cafés became the meeting halls for artists and literary figures.
44 The artists gathered at the café may not be as great as those of the past, but faces worth watching are just the same. 45 You’ll see the old men in navy berets; ultra-thin, bronzed women with hair dyed bright orange; and schoolchildren sharing an afternoon chocolate with their mothers. The café in Paris has always been a place for seeing and being seen.
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