Paris just knows how to do December. The decorations are chic, never gaudy, and even if you don't go inside the stores, the window displays alone are dazzling. The incredible Dior display in the windows of Printemps beauty store (below) features hundreds of tiny marionettes wearing Dior fashion specially made by the fashion house's own atelier – they all move and dance and float. You have to venture into Colette though – push past the crowds of hipsters who spend hours thronging the pavement outside (even in the rain), perhaps hoping that some of the store's cool will waft out of the doors and infuse them – the beauty edit is brilliant, from US pharmacist brand C.O. Bigelow and English natural ranges REN and Burt's Bees to Topshop make-up. Also recommend Germain restaurant on rue Baci over by the Marais where you can follow your steak and chips with a banana split or comically large chocolate eclair. Staff are ludicrously good-looking – in fact everyone in there seems to have fabulous hair and a figure that you do not get from eating banana splits and comically large chocolate eclairs. But the food's great. Perhaps the most Christmassy thing to do, though, is stop for hot chocolate in Angelina on the Rue de Rivoli, where Chanel and Audrey Hepburn both hung out – it's legendary for good reason.
