Paris Vacation

Puces de St-Ouen - MUST SEE Number 20 - Its easy to lose track of an entire weekend morning browsing the acres of fine antiques, covetable curios and general bric-a-brac at St-Ouen, the mother of Paris’s flea markets.

The St-Ouen market, sometimes called the Clignancourt market, is located just outside the northern edge of the 18 arrondissement, in the suburb of St-Ouen.  Its officially open on Saturday, Sunday and Monday from 9am to 6:30pm - although this can vary depending on the weather, and many stands are closed on Monday.  Its poular name of les puces de St-Ouen, or the “St-Ouen flea market,” dates from the days when secondhand mattresses, clothes, and other infested junk was sold here in a free-for-all zone outside the city walls.  Nowadays, however, it’s predominantly a proper - and very expensive - antiques market, selling mainly furniture, but also old zinc cafe counters, telephones, traffic lights, posters, jukeboxes and so on.

The closest metro stop is Port-de-Clignancourt (line 4), from where it’s a five-minute walk up the busy avenue de la Porte-de-Clignancourt.  For a slower but quieter approach, you can go to the Porte de St-Ouen stop (line 13) and walk north along the avenue de la Porte de St-Ouen, turning right after the peripherique flyover, and continuing along rue du Dr Barbinski for about ten minutes until it meets rue Jean-Henri-Fabre.