The Art of The French Picnic
Welcome to France Month at Elephantine! All month, we will be traveling to France—from Paris to Provence, we’ll lounge and luxuriate in the land of je ne sais quoi, exploring the places and philosophies on living and eating that make French culture so inspirational and intriguing. Our focus is simple—to appreciate, yes, to be inspired, of course, but primarily, to embody the sense that the spirit of France is accessible to us anywhere and anytime. As Ursula le Guin writes, “It is in your spirit, or it is nowhere.”
So as we closed our eyes and pictured being swept off to France in our imagination, the idea of a picnic danced around in our minds as a quintessential French delight—something which reflects fundamental values that color so many aspects of French culture. It is foremost an expression of the luxury of simplicity. That with no more than a few elements, time, and an inspired state of mind, one can have a transportive and deeply connective experience. So we’re starting our tour of France with the art of the French picnic, with picnic baskets available at Elephantine for you to create your own magical French excursion right here. But first, a peek into picnics.
The French Picnic | Past
Prior to the French Revolution in 1789, picnics were a leisure activity reserved for French aristocracy. Fêtes-champêtres, pastoral feasts, were open-air excursions of mirth and merriment. Widely enjoyed at Versailles, these gatherings typically involved dressing up for a day of simple pleasures, music, and dancing on the lavish grounds of the French royal court.
Fête Champêtre by Jean-Antoine Watteau, circa 1722
Marie Antoinette picnics at Hameau de la Reine, Versailles
Fête-champêtre by Jean-Baptiste Peter, 18th century
After the French Revolution, royal grounds opened to French citizens and picnics were democratized, slowly becoming incorporated into the leisure activities of French society at large. By the mid 1800s, picnics and informal outdoor meals were commonplace enough to be portrayed in Impressionist artworks. From Manet’s controversial Le Déjeuner sur L'herbe in 1863 to Renoir’s Le Déjeuner des Canotiers in 1875, the picnic had secured its place in everyday French life and the art that it inspired.
Le Déjeuner sur L'herbe, detail | Claude Monet, 1866
The French Picnic | Present
Grace Kelly and Cary Grant picnic on the French Riviera in Alfred Hitchcock’s To Catch A Thief, 1955
Today, the picnic endures, thrives even. A relic of slower times still compelling in a world buzzing at an ever-greater speed. But what has made the picnic so enduring?
Maybe it’s the tension between the simplicity of a picnic and its luxury. Maybe it’s the fact that no matter how advanced societies become, deep inside, we know that the most simple things are truly the most luxurious. Perhaps it’s the fact that picnics require time, the greatest commodity of modern living. Perhaps the ingredients of a picnic—simple food, nature, company, a good book, lovely music—are ones that nourish us most deeply at the level of body and spirit.
It is this particular mix of factors that we find wildly compelling at Elephantine, as we are in eternal pursuit of what is authentic and timeless and important in the human experience. A picnic epitomizes so much of what is meaningful to us. So, we decided to make it our first excursion in France.
Available beginning this week at Elephantine, we’ve assembled a picnic basket designed to whisk us away to France.
“A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread—and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness”
As always, we would love to hear from you. Have you had a memorable picnic? Do you have a favorite local picnic spot? Do you have a favorite French picnic spot? Please share! That’s the great thing about traveling together. Also, to engage on social media, please use the hashtag #elephantineontour.