Apple Opera Store in Paris Hands-On: New French Apple Store Impresses, the French Way

Whether you travel to Paris in winter or summer, you’ll surely end up visiting some remarkable worldwide renowned spots. Each different neighborhood has its own special places, but I’m not going to spoil it all for you. We’ll be looking at Paris from the tech point of view, and today we have the new Apple Opera Store in our sights.

One of the most Apple stores in the world, and I haven’t seen them all yet, is the one found under the Louvre. Not only is it situated in a great location, one filled with plenty of important history bits for Western Europe, and not only, but it is also packed with all your favorite gadgets from Apple. And even if you happen to really hate Apple, and there are plenty of reasons for doing so, you’ll still have fun checking out the store.

But wait, there’s more! Apple decided to open a new Apple store in a hot new location. Situated right across the Opera, which is one of the most impressive buildings in Paris, the new Apple Store has just been opened a few weeks ago. Since then lots of customers have passed through those doors and, since I happened to be strolling in Paris, I simply had to see it for myself. The video above will show you exactly what I’ve seen. And besides all the pictures I took, you’ll also notice how I recorded a little bit of daily Opera Apple Store routine/activity using the iPhone 4’s new recording features.

The first impression I got is that the Opera Apple store is just a little smaller than the Louvre store. But once inside I found plenty of space to explore the new iPhone 4, the iPad, all the new MacBooks Pro, the iMacs, the iPods and all the accessories. There’s plenty of room on the main floor for Apple’s famous by now display tables, and the Genius bars and one-to-one sessions await on the top floor too. Just when you thought you’re done playing with all those hot toys, you end up heading down to the cellars, where, among accessories and all the extra software your money can buy, you’ll find a pretty big door that looks like it belonged to a pretty secure safe at some point during its tumultuous life. Do you guys know what the building at 2 rue Halévy housed in its distant past?

What store do I like better between the Louvre and the Opera Apple stores in Paris? I’ll stick with the one just across the street from the Opera. It must be all that technology packed in one of those impressive, magical, I’d rather say, Paris buildings. Oh, and after you check out the video below, feel free to browse through the official pictures of the Apple Opera Store found in the gallery below.

What tech-related store has captured your imagination this summer?