Nineteenth-century Paris invented a figure Baudelaire loved: the flâneur, someone who walked strictly without an objective — not to burn calories, not to reach a café, just to be bathed in the city. Walter Benjamin noted that 1840s dandies took it further: they walked turtles through the arcades and let the turtles set the pace. Try that speed in Manhattan today.
The Flâneur
•1 min read•Thoughts