At a couple of points in my life I have been lucky enough to spend some time in Paris.  I devoted a lot of that time to perusal of the Left Bank and can see and smell it (lots of boulangeries!) right now!

For a long time Rive Gauche, by YSL, was my signature scent.  Megan got a kick out of buying me a bottle of the perfume from the YSL shop on the Left Bank when she was there!  

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The arrondissements of Paris, with the Seine River bisecting the city. The Rive Gauche is the southern half.

La Rive Gauche (The Left Bank) is the southern bank of the Seine River in Paris. Here the river flows roughly westwards, cutting the city into two: the Right Bank to the north and the Left Bank to the south.

The Rue Cler Neighborhood

Located in the 7th arrondissement on the left bank of the Seine, the rue Cler is just blocks away from the Eiffel Tower and Invilades and is a true Parisian market street. Traffic free since 1984, the shops that line this picturesque cobble stoned street overflow onto the sidewalk and street . There are flower shops and bakeries, as well as chocolate, wine, and cheese shops, along with restaurants, hotels, a bank and post office - everything you need to survive. The Denis Auvray Bakery (45 rue Cler) is a great place to buy baguettes, pastries, and sandwiches on the run or for a picnic. The Grand Hotel Leveque (29 rue Cler) is a bargain and streetside rooms are a great vantage point for watching the life on this busy street.

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The Left Bank is one of the city's most romantic districts. This is the Paris of another era; the Paris of artists, writers, and philosophers, including Pablo Picasso,

Seated Woman, famous Picasso Painting

Henri Matisse, Jean-Paul Sartre, Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and dozens of other members of the great artistic community at Montparnasse. Some of its famous streets are the Boulevard Saint-Germain, Boulevard Saint-Michel, and the Rue de Rennes.

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More than simply a geographical region, the Left Bank has become a name for a particular lifestyle, fashion, or "look". In 1966 Yves Saint-Laurent launched a ready-to-wear line by the name Rive Gauche.Yves Saint Laurent, the French designer, poses with two fashion models, Betty Calroux (left) and Loulou de la Falaise, outside his 'Rive Gauche' shop in 1969 in an unspecifed location. The legendary couturier, who launched his fashion house in 1962, has died age 71 in Paris.

The collection was an attempt to democratize fashion, introducing elements of garments of the lower classes into high fashion, such as the leather jacket.

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The Latin Quarter is a Left Bank area, in the 5th arrondissement.of Paris.

The area is generally associated with artists, intellectual and a bohemian way of life; this is mainly due to the thousands of students living around.

But the place also has a history of political unrest : In 1871, the Place Saint Michel became the center of the Paris Commune, and in may 1968, it was a site of student uprising.

Today the eastern half has become sufficiently chic, however, to house members of the French Establishment.

The place contains many of the Paris monuments, museums and gardens, ranging from the brand-new Institut du Monde Arabe to the Middle Age Musëe de Cluny, or the Musëum National d'Histoire Naturelle in the Jardin des Plantes.