Almost every building in the central square of the old village of Mougins is now a restaurant, an art gallery, or a combination of both.

Off the square, in the tiny car-free streets and alleys, the same, but interspersed with expensive gift shops. These shops are mainly full of interior decoration products but there is a hat shop and one small grocery.

The progress of this town seems to have reached a full stop. It now seems destined to be a tourist destination forever. There is nothing wrong with this but as time passes, it becomes harder and harder to imagine what it might have been like as a small village of working class people.

There is the odd reminder of times before, ghost writing high on the village walls, left now one imagines, for aesthetic reasons rather than dereliction or oversight.

round and round
the lunchtime diners
a boy and his bike

Paul Conneally
Mougins, France, 2013