Montmartre's back lanes

One street over from the tour-group circuit, Montmartre still looks like the village the painters found: Rue de l'Abreuvoir curving downhill past ivy-covered walls to La Maison Rose, the little pink café that has anchored a thousand paintings; Rue des Saules dropping past the Clos Montmartre vineyard — actual vines, inside Paris; lamp posts, steps and cobbles at every turn.

Morning is the whole game. Before roughly 9:30 the lanes are empty enough to shoot down the middle of the street; by 11 every angle has a tour group in it. Light on the butte is kind early — the east-facing lanes catch it first — and overcast days work almost as well, because the streets are their own subject.

Practicalities: it is genuinely steep, and the cobbles punish heels — flat shoes between frames. La Maison Rose is a working restaurant: shoot from the street and keep the terrace clear. And skip the Sacré-Cœur parvis for portraits — the view is better two lanes back, without the crowd.