I just came back from a 2-day, spur-of-the-moment trip to Paris during fashion week. This wasn’t planned at all: the Infinity +1 tour starts in a few days so I was supposed to just stay home and get ready. But last Friday Kanye popped into New York for a Vanessa Beecroft art show that he helped curate, and I went to check it out and say hi to the homie. As the naked ladies were laying between the statues of naked ladies, he told me he was dipping to the airport to catch a flight to Paris. “You should come, it’ll be fun.” I gave the old “I wish I could go but my tour is about to start and I’ve got a million things to finish up” response. It was such a caricature, I was the “regular guy” in a Visa commercial who ponders the impulsive purchase for once in his life. I went home pensive, and when I woke up the next morning I thought “you know what? I’m going.” 

I landed in Paris early Sunday morning and headed to my hotel. As I feared my room wasn’t ready yet and would be ready for many hours. I hadn’t slept on the flight so I went to Mehdi’s house, crawled up in a corner, slipped on an eye mask and said “don’t mind me, guys!” and caught up on some Z’s. When I woke up it dawned on me that I didn’t actually have any real plans for these 2 days, but it didn’t seem like that mattered. I called Kanye, he said “we’re about to go hit some fashion shows, meet me in my lobby in 20 minutes” and that was that. 

I’ve never been to a fashion show before. The first one we hit was Hussein Chalayan, and it turned out to be the best show I saw. My first surprise was that there weren’t really any other musicians or actors or celebrity types that I would recognize. Not that this matters to me, I really don’t care about spotting celebs, but I just thought it was interesting that Kanye would go to these events where none of his peers go. In fact I found out that it’s really hard to get into the fashion shows and he’s just been really persistent in the last few years to infiltrate this world. This particular show was in what looked like an old cathedral. They told me this was the same spot where the infamous picture of the dressed-up entourage was taken earlier in the year. We were a smaller group this time and rest assured, I was dressed how I normally dress. After that we went to get some food and stopped by Gareth Pugh’s showroom, where I randomly ran into an old friend from high school who’s now a big designer’s assistant. I don’t know that much about the fashion world so I had to bluff when he said the guy’s name. Then we went to the Givenchy show.

This one was huge, and it was also running really late. I was sitting with Ibn and Muriel and as we were waiting I said “man, I should just walk down the runway.” Ibn pulled out his camera, started filming and said “do it!” I was torn! This scene is so stuck up, I loved the idea of pulling a prank. But I was also scared to get tackled down by security. The runway zigzagged and was separated into a few segments, and there was one part right behind us that looked like a runway but was lined with people facing the other direction. If I was going to walk down anything, it would be that thing. Ibn said “I’ll film you walking, so I’ll walk with you.” With that, I said “Let’s go!” and I did it. I started walking down this faux-runway, doing my best model strut. It was dead silent which made it super awkward! For a second I thought that Ibn had left me stranded because I couldn’t see him. This runway was long. Halfway through I pulled the official 180 and started walking back, and I also spotted him right next to me. I waved hello to the hundreds of people ignoring me and finally reclaimed my seat. Then the real show started. We went to a 3rd joint after that: Sonia Rykiel.

This one was hilarious. It was much, much smaller, the runway was circular and all the model girls were talking as they walked, blurting out the most random statements and repeating them as they strolled with an Alice In Wonderland gaze. “I am wearing a black sweater!” “I am the red fox.” “In life one has to make choices. I choose these shoes.” Some of them spoke in French, others in English, all with heavy Eastern-European accents. Since there are many models on the runway at any given time, it quickly turned into a One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest scenario where you heard these voices bouncing around from all different parts of the room. When that was over it was dinnertime.

I split up with the group for dinner and went to eat at Mehdi’s house with him and Pedro. It was nice to escape from the glamour and glitz for a bit and spend some normal time with friends. They had been out late the last 2 nights so they decided not to go out after. So when we were done I went back to meet Kanye and crew at this restaurant where they were just starting to eat.

I think my body was really confused with the time difference so what started with “sure I’ll try this snail” ended with me having an entire 2nd dinner. My friend Carri (Cassette Playa) was there too. We both wanted to go see James Murphy at Chez Regine. The guys decided they wanted to go too and we all hopped in 2 cars. Somehow we pulled up at another club, a models-and-bottles spot where everyone was crammed and people-watching. By the time we left there and went to Regine the night was dying down and James wasn’t DJing anymore.

The rest of the guys went back to their hotel and I made one last stop at Le Baron before calling it a night. For anyone following my twitters that’s where I saw a man who looked like a minotaur. I finally headed back to my hotel, the scenester favorite and very practical Hotel Amour. 

I wasn’t interested in waking up early to catch a 10am Stella McCartney show. Instead I slept in and caught up with my real-world emails and news for sec before diving back into the bubble. I met up with the guys at 4:30 at the Viktor & Rolf show. Again we found ourselves waiting for the show to start. We weren’t all sitting together, and Don C yelled out “A-Trak, walk!” from the other end of the room… but that was a one-time thing.

Traffic was bad that day so a good part of the afternoon was consumed sitting in a van.

The last show we attended was YSL. This one was huge and the attendance was heavy in the nobility. I just sat back and observed. I must admit I was starting to grow tired of the constant superficial talk that I was overhearing around me and although I was still definitely having fun, I was glad to be only there for 2 days. It felt like the perfect length for some escapism before reality could kick in. It was also women’s fashion week and sometimes women’s dresses just don’t speak to me much!

Anyway we went to get dinner afterwards at this restaurant on top of the Pompidou center with a great view on the whole city.

On both days I enjoyed the dinners a lot because that’s when we could have animated discussions. I’m always very vocal with those guys so I like any setting where we can talk! Carri came to join us again. We were planning on checking out Q-Tip’s show that evening but we didn’t realize he was playing early and he hit the stage right as we sat down at the restaurant. To end it off we went to this Stella party where Pedro was DJing, and I ran into some friends there as well. This spot was also less stuck-up than a lot of the places we went so it was a good way to end the trip. 

An early flight awaited me and I had a bit of work to do before going to sleep so I didn’t stay out too late. I woke up early to film this hotel review — it takes a lot of discipline! — and I made my way to the airport.

Somehow just because it was raining it was really hard to call a cab, and I got to the airport at the very last second. I knew it was this airline’s only flight of the day, so in the cab my conscience started weighing in. “Shit, I’m gonna be stuck here one more day, now it’s really going to mess me up.” But miraculously they let me on the plane and I could breathe again.