Day 3 of the Paris workshop had us spending a good portion of our day just outside of the city in La Defense, the city’s financial district. As you can imagine it’s full of modern architecture and one of my favorite areas to photograph. First, some details from Bassin Takis.

A short walk from here is Raymond Moretti’s La Cheminée, a 32-metre-high “chimney” made up of hundreds of colored tubes. It was fun playing with the warped reflections in the surrounding buildings.


Not certain which buildings these are, but liked the tones and shapes.

Just across the plaza is Tour Majunga. A great angled facade makes for some fun.


Along with the interplay among neighboring buildings.

This bench was a nice unexpected find!


Now, onto Tour EDF by the same architect who designed the Louvre pyramids, I. M, Pei. He also designed the Hyatt Center in Chicago. For those of you familiar with this building, you’ll likely see the similarity in the designs. The disc-like awning is a lot of fun to photograph. And the tones of the metal are great!




Bouncing back across the plaza is an unmistakable Alexander Calder sculpture. This one is called L’Araignée Rouge (the red spider).

Below you see two versions, the color and the black & white. Usually, I don’t like this sculpture in black & white since the color is so amazing, but for some reason, I felt like it worked this time. The harsh light, shadows and blown-out sky seem to make it work in a more graphic way. What do you prefer?


A couple more B&W versions…

Then this skeletal facade of the Les Quatre Temps Mall.

Next, the Grande Arche. The light was really pretty that afternoon and there was a bluish cast that worked well.


At its corners some harsh light and geometric shadows.

After a little break we headed to Fondation Louis Vuitton designed by Frank Gehry. Such an amazing space, we could’ve spent hours here. One of my favorite areas is the lower level with the wall of mirrors and reflecting pool.



From the outdoor, upper level you can get some good abstracts of the building’s structural features.

Looking like a double exposure by shooting through the glass of one of the billowing “sails” of the facade and the structure behind.

From ground level of the exterior, more ways to play with abstracts of the structure.




After a stop for dinner we lucked out with the most amazing sunset from Tour Montparnasse.

And because I have a thing for clouds I couldn’t pass up a detail shot of these beauties!

In case you missed Day 1 & Day 2. Also, all the pics from this workshop here. Stay tuned at Photography Unfolded for the next Paris workshop coming in June 2019, registration opens very soon!