Tiffany enjoyed playing with the material and pushed his artisans to achieve an unexpected outcome. He valued flawed pieces of glass for the way they would fracture light, and his windows feature patterns of tiny confetti-like pieces.

An expanded version of the show will open in Richmond on May 29, and, according to the VMFA’s Robin Nicholson, it will include additional windows from the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, as well as many other Tiffany objects from the VMFA collection.

The exhibition is being co-curated by the three prominent Tiffany scholars: Alice Cooney Frelinghuysen of the Metropolitan Museum of Art; Martin Eidelberg, an independent scholar who co-curated the last show at New York Historical about the female designers in Tiffany Studios; and Rosalind Pepall, curator of decorative arts at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. The restoration of the Montreal museum’s Erskine and American Church occasioned the removal of the windows and launched the idea of sending them out on exhibit.

19 rue Vaugirard

Through January 17, 2010

Monday and Friday 10:30-10:00

Tuesday-Thursday from 10:30-7

Saturday, Sunday and holidays from 9:30-8

www.senat.fr/visite/MuseeduLuxembourg.html

Exhibition Schedule:

Montreal Fine Arts Museum- February 11 to May 2

Virginia Museum of Fine Arts -May 29 to August 15

If You’re Going:

Café Médicis is the museum’s adorable café, with outdoor tables that are plopping distance from the entrance. Count on it for a coffee if you are feeling winded.

But if you still have steam in your sails, venture deeper into the Luxembourg Gardens, just past the glorious ivy garland-draped Fontaine Médicis (built from the remnants of a 1630 Italianate grotto), and find a place at the outdoor café for classic café attitude en plein air.

For café dining par excellence, check out Bouillon Racine, a fantastic brasserie in an authentic 1906 Art Nouveau interior. It is listed as a historical monument, but the food would hold up anywhere. So order up your escargots and duck confit, but don’t even think of skipping their Valrhona chocolate glace or, at the very least, a tiny plate of delicious grape, lemon and peach sherbet. Be sure and have a look at the second floor, which is a gorgeous copper-green cage of mirrors and glass. 3 rue Racine, open daily noon to 11:00

There are two nice hotels on Rue de Vaugirard that you could hit either with a well-aimed bouclé from the Jardin du Luxembourg. Hôtel Fontaines du Luxembourg, at No. 4 Rue Vaugirard, was built into an ancient residence once used to house Louis XIV’s grooms. The lobby and guest rooms are stylishly redone, but the façade needed a few more weeks to finish when we were there in late September. I would check the status of the renovation before booking.

Best Western Trianon Rive Gauche at No. 1 rue de Vaugirard, where I stayed, was tidy and polite and about 40 Euros less expensive per night than Fontaines. Boasts a stunning view of the Pantheon from the front door.

Check back for more Paris dispatches ....