The most in-demand Parisian properties are the ones with amazing views. It’s no surprise, really: Who wouldn’t want this cityscape as a live-in tableau? Luckily, there are some incredible furnished flats with views available for short-term rent. So on your next swing through the city, skip the claustrophobic hotel and rent a light-filled apartment instead. You’ll not only be able to throw impromptu soirées, cook up market finds in your own kitchen, gain space and save precious cash, you’ll have a frame on the city that most Parisians dream of.

For the inside scoop on the most picturesque Parisian pads on the market, please welcome guest blogger Erica Berman, owner of the divine apartment rental agency, Haven in Paris and the HiP Paris Blog.

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Text by Erica Berman, photos courtesy Haven in Paris

When I first moved to Paris seventeen years ago I lived in a tiny, lightless studio in the heart of St Germain. My second flat had bars on the windows and overlooked a small cement courtyard. It was even darker, but what did I care, I was in Paris??

It wasn’t until my French friend Evelyn swung by to check out my new digs that I literally saw the light. Upon entering my cozy cave, she blurted “C’est tellement sombre ici, il te faut de la lumière!” According to Evelyn, light and views should be a top priority when choosing an apartment in Paris. Since the city is so overcast you need to brighten the corners whenever and however you can in order to stay sane.

I took her advice, and found myself a lovely 4th floor flat in the hilly area of Montmartre with East/West exposure, views of the Moulin Rouge and surrounding rooftops. I fell so in love with my perch that I bought an apartment in the same area ten years later. Though the flat was a 5-floor walk-up, the sunrise, sunsets, balcony, common garden, singing birds, and unobstructed views of Paris made the choice an easy one, and the move a joy.

While Paris apartments are all too often dark and viewless, if you’re patient and persistent you can find an apartment with amazing views, light, and colors. My personal quest for light inspired me to start Haven in Paris so that others, even tourists passing through, could share this privileged perspective on the city.

When I select apartments to rent to travelers, I start by thinking of what I love and value in a living space. In addition to having a great location and interior space, they need to offer something exceptional—a view, a balcony, a garden—that you won’t find in your typical Parisian hotel room.

Personally, I find the best light and views to be in Montmartre, a hip and funky hilltop neighborhood with panoramic views of the city that, not so surprisingly, I’ve decided to call home.

Haven In Paris’ Top Ten Rooms with Views

1. Designer Penthouse w/Terrace
Five bedroom, 300m2 left bank penthouse with a panoramic view of the city.

2. Abbesses – Montmartre
One bedroom with panoramic view of entire city on one side, and balcony with view of Sacre Coeur on the other.

3. Bac Penthouse w/Terrace – St. Germain
Two-bedroom penthouse in St. Germain with a small terrace and views of the Eiffel Tower and other monuments.

4. Livingstone Penthouse – Montmartre
Studio in Montmartre with amazing Paris rooftop and Sacre Coeur views.

5.  Houdon – Montmartre
One bedroom in Montmartre with amazing sunset and rooftops views with Les Invalides in the distance.

6. Carnot – Champs Elysees
Three-bedroom apartment with balcony and views of the Arc de Triumph and Eiffel Tower.

7. Ecoles – St. Germain
Two-bedroom in St Germain with balcony and views of Notre Dame, Sacre Coeur, Cluny Museum, and Paris rooftops.

8. Boulangers – St. Germain
One bedroom apartment in St. Germain with view of Notre Dame.

9. Place des Vosges - Marais
One bedroom apartment overlooking the Place des Vosges.

10. Elzevir – Marais
One bedroom with amazing garden views of the back of the Institute Suedois.

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Prices: €550-€5500/week, depending on season and size.

Since all of Paris closes shop in August, I’ll be posting “by appointment” discoveries made during my summertime travels back home in the USA this month.  Hope you enjoy this special summer edition with content from New York, Los Angeles and Maine.

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Appointment: To follow a 2-hour guided tour of Lotusland, the  37-acre estate and private garden created by Madame Ganna Walska.
Where: Ninety miles north of Los Angeles in Montecito, an affluent suburb of Santa Barbara
When: July 2nd, 2009
Time 1:30pm

An international celebutante and irresistible beauty, Madame Ganna Walska loved plants. And opera. And seducing wealthy older men. (Don’t you love her already?) All accounts from her era speak of a captivating creature with a preternatural proclivity for exuberance and glamorous excess. No one batted an eyelash at the outrageous title of her memoire, Always Room At The Top, published in 1946 because, what the hell else would she call it?

From her humble beginnings in Poland until her death in 1984 at the age of ninety-seven, she married six men—including a Russian count, a renowned endocrinologist, a Rockefeller divorcée, the heir to the Smith Carpet Manufacturing company, the inventor of the Death Ray, and a Yogi mystic with a philosophy PhD—who through death or divorce passed much of their fortune along to her.

But it’s what “Madame” (née Hanna Puacz) did with her accumulated wealth that was the final glorious act in her masterpiece theatre of life. In 1941, at the urgings of her sixth and final husband (she gave up after that) she purchased a thirty-seven-acre estate ninety miles north of Los Angeles in the manicured town of Montecito.

Initially intended as a retreat for Tibetan Lamas and a place for her husband to practice his spiritual work, she christened it “Tibetland.” After their divorce, she changed the name to “Lotusland” in tribute to the rare Indian flowers in her lotus pond and her newfound independence. From that day forward her one and only love was her garden.

“She was a total diva and she was very smart. She created this place so that people would talk about her long after her death,” says our docent before heading out on a 2-hr tour through the private botanical garden she spent the last 40 years of her life designing with the brash, eccentric whimsy that she applied to every aspect of her life.

She famously sent her garden assistants out on tours of the neighborhood with strict instructions to purchase the largest and most magnificent plants they could find, regardless as to whether or not the specimens were up for sale. Armed with cash and Walska’s determination on their backs, they always came home with the goods.

Channeling her years on the stage and penchant for theatrics, she used plants for their form and structure to create dramatic botanical experiences.

The 3,000 rare and exotic species in Lotusland are organized into enchanting chapters.  Some are poetic, like the Blue Garden with its delicate mélange of blue-shaded species; some insouciant and bold, like the mass plantings of Giant Palms; some moody and biographic, like the Theatre Garden full of statues from Madame’s chateau in France that were smuggled to the USA during the war; and others gloriously excessive and wild, like the Succulent Garden with it’s Climbing Onion plants or the Cycad Garden, the second largest in the world and by far the estate’s most valuable.

It’s impossible to tour the gardens without feeling the idiosyncratic force of nature behind it, just as Madame had wished.

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Reservations: Visits are by appointment only. To make a tour reservation call 805-969-9990 or email reservation@lotusland.org.
Schedule: Tours are offered 10am and 1:30pm Wednesday through Saturday between mid-February and mid-November.
Admission: Adults 19 years of age and older, $35; children age five to 18, $10; children under five, free.