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After bringing happiness to the heart of every fly fisherman in Paris, the famous flyshop La Maison de la Mouche, on l’île Saint Louis, closes its door forever.

Tears are coming to my eyes as I right this post.

Everytime I drive back home in Eastern Paris, I manage to drive on bridge Henri IV, just for the pleasure of driving by La Maison de la Mouche. I’ve been doing it for years, on my bicycle, on my scooter, on my motorbike, in my car. Everytime I would look at the flyshop window, as any parisian fly fisher, it would fill me with dreams of wilderness and fish! Than when I was older I managed to push the door and it was for me as if I wallked in a candy store. The canoe attached to the ceiling, the thousands of flies, the rods and reels I could not offer myself because they were too expensive, I usually came out after buying something for less than 10$, but it’s value was much more than that it came from La Maison de La Mouche ! therefore it had something special, something that would off course make me a better fisherman.

So today, as I drove by, I saw big yellow posters on the windows, I told myself it’s the sales but reading carefully it said, Everything must go! -50% ! I almost crashed in the car ahead of me! All the memories I had came to my mind, I thought of Alain and his wife who bought back the shop a decade ago, I thought of my friends Atsushi Ashegawa who had moved from Japan especially to work there, I thought of our friend Jérôme Servonnat who brought people from trout fishing to Pike fishing, I thought of all those kids who managed to live their passino by pushing that door. The two ladies who owned the store passed away and their family has other vues on La Maison de La Mouche, they don’t beleive in history, on landmarks, they did not renew the bail. Thank you so much all of you for those years, it’s a sad day.

Here what Laurent wrote for the 80th anniversary of the flyshop, in 2014:

The Maison de la mouche is a parisian institution. For 80 years now, it’s been telling the legend of fly fishing, surrounded by what’s left of the medieval Paris, in front of a little square, and especially at a stone’s throw from the upstream tip of th Ile St Louis, dividing the Seine river. Every time I go there, I remember my student years, the mornings when we walked up still drunk from the Marais towards the Sorbonne. I always stopped in front of the Tibors, shinning through the windows of the shop. The others would light a cigarette, reeking with irony, and I would join them knowing they

But the week-end of the 15th was not about nostalgia. We were there to celebrate the Maison, and even more to celebrate fly fishing. The guys from Simms were there too (in particular Stephan Schmid from FlyFishEurope) telling everyone with unadultered passion how great their gear is. Marco Crippa (from Swiss CDC) was at the vise, showing a couple of nice tricks involving cdc and Petitjean’s tools. And then there was a lot of traffic between the shop and the Seine, because Thibaud Giband was down there, demoing, teaching, explaining stuff, doing more or less anything you can do when you’re one of the few EFFA, FFF (and SIM and FFPML) certified instructors and you’re a terminal stage casting geek, and you’ve decided to share that with everyone willing to. Sascha Bachman (Simms/Scott…) was there too. He spent like a full hour of his precious time trying to show me how to do a proper roll cast upstream and into the wind. After that, he politely concluded that maybe it was all a matter of luck.

As the night came, more substantial pleasures replaced the joys of flying lines. A dedicated young man from the 38 Saint Louis shop, the deli from the corner, came at the Maison’s request to provide us with a most delightful buffet, the kind no memorable day should ever end without. Amongst fine cheese and voluptuous wines, Marco lead the guests at the vise, in order for everyone to contribute a couple of dubbing turns on the 80th Fly, a collective effort later suitably framed and signed by the authors. Of course, such a debauchery couldn’t but end with the return of the monomania, and Thibaut showed us how to do without a rod, and to shoot line with bare hands. A most useful skill, and so much fun!

The sunday, as it’s name suggests, was all about wind and rain, and two handed spey casts. Plus a fun session about fiberglass, just enough to get a spanking about proper power application… Long story short: it was a fantastic week-end. We knew it, we told you so… Next time, drop by !