Do You Speak Wine? Here's an Exclusive WICE Event to Learn How!

This spring, WICE offers members a bouquet of wines! Paris wine expert Hélène Goble will help spare you those awkward moments puzzling over wine lists, and help you choose favorite wines at any budget with confidence.

Hélène’s small and personalized company, “Do You Speak Wine?” operates by word of mouth, but you can join an exclusive WICE wine tasting at her elegant Paris apartment on 27 April. Along with her class on a Lalande de Pomerol (Bordeaux) wine, she will be sharing dinner, and plenty of special tips on French savoir-faire.

Helène grew up with grapes, on a Bordeaux vineyard run by her aristocratic parents. After a stint working in the Paris wine trade, she took up training at London’s prestigious Wine and Spirit Education Trust. She later marketed

Hail to the Chef!

Meet WICE Cooking Instructor, Randall Price

Do you dare try a sauce Béarnaise? Do you dream of making a savoury tart adapted from an 18th century recipe? Or a light vegetable medley that will impress your summer guests? There are just a few spots left for three cooking classes this year with WICE cooking instructor, Randall Price, born in Ohio, and now a distinguished chef in the food capital of the world.

His popular cooking lessons for WICE members, full of witty commentary, center on a two-course meal with clear, written recipes. They are in the French tradition of fresh and seasonal ingredients, with some

Louvre Islamic Collection: Peace Through Art

While the U.S. struggles with the controversy over the ban on travelers from seven mainly Muslim countries, France provides a source of cross-cultural diplomacy at the Islamic Art Collection at the Louvre, the most visited museum in the world.

This initiative was the brainchild of President Jacques Chirac, who vigorously opposed the Iraq invasion, and called for a “dialogue of cultures” to break down misunderstandings between the West and Muslim world with its petroleum rich regions.

The new wing opened in 2012, at a cost of a hundred thousand euros, co-funded by Arab states. Like the glass pyramid, the project came as a shock, thrusting together the medieval Western style and a contemporary design in a powerful frisson. A vast, undulating canopy of steel, glass and perforated aluminium hovers over 3000 works, the best Islamic art in Europe. Technology and art converge in poetry that suggests the rolling dunes of the Middle Eastern landscape, the veils of dances or even a flying carpet!