This July 14 asks a lot of a Francophile. Les Bleus kick off a World Cup semifinal at noon. A free French festival fills California Plaza in downtown Los Angeles beginning at 5 p.m. But before any of this, at 10 a.m., in a room on North Lake Avenue, the Alliance Française de Pasadena will pour coffee, set out viennoiseries and spend one hour talking — entirely in French — about the scarf.
The Café Culturel, titled “L’Art du Foulard à la Française,” or The Art of the French Scarf, runs from 10 to 11 a.m. Tuesday, July 14, at the Alliance’s center at 232 N. Lake Ave., Suite 105. It is the organization’s own Bastille Day observance in a year when the holiday’s regional footprint is considerably larger, and it is deliberately modest by design.
“On Bastille Day itself, we keep the celebration intimate with one of our Café Culturel gatherings, while also encouraging our community to attend the larger festivities organized by the French Consulate in Los Angeles, of which we are a proud cultural partner,” Emma Franks, the Alliance’s executive director, said in written responses provided to this newspaper.
According to the Alliance’s event announcement, participants will discuss the history and cultural significance of the French scarf — an accessory the announcement says has been essential to French dress for more than 500 years — over a traditional French breakfast, with coffee and pastries from Oh La La, a French bakery on East Colorado Boulevard in Pasadena. Attendees are asked to bring a favorite scarf and share the story behind it, and organizers are seeking a volunteer for a scarf-tying demonstration. The conversation will be held in French. Registration is $15 for non-members and $10 for members.
The rest of the day belongs to bigger stages. At noon Pacific time, France plays Spain in a FIFA World Cup semifinal at Dallas Stadium, with a place in the July 19 final at stake. France has won all six of its matches in the tournament, most recently defeating Morocco 2-0 in the quarterfinal.
That evening, the Consulate General of France in Los Angeles and Grand Performances host the second edition of Bastille Day Los Angeles at California Plaza in downtown Los Angeles. According to the organizers, the free open-air event runs from 5 to 10 p.m. and includes a concert featuring rapper Black M, singer-songwriter Barbara Pravi and DJ Joachim Garraud, along with a French market of 15 to 20 booths reserved for French products and vendors. The Consulate said last year’s inaugural edition drew more than 2,500 people, and a French government announcement described the 2026 event as “bigger, more ambitious and still open to all.”
The timing means a determined Pasadena Francophile could, in a single day, start with coffee and conversation on Lake Avenue, watch the semifinal at midday and end the evening downtown.
Bastille Day, known in France as le 14 juillet, commemorates the storming of the Bastille prison in Paris on July 14, 1789. Organizers of celebrations across the country, including the Alliance network, have tied this year’s events to the 250th anniversary of Franco-American friendship, a theme running through 2026 programming nationwide.
“For the French, July 14 is much more than a national holiday,” Franks said in her written responses. The Alliance, she said, celebrates French language and culture year-round, with monthly lectures, film discussions, book clubs and conversation groups. “Whether someone joins us for a conversation over coffee or attends the Consulate’s festivities, Bastille Day offers a wonderful opportunity to experience French culture.”
The Alliance Française de Pasadena, a nonprofit French language school and cultural center, celebrated its centennial in 2024 and is one of more than 100 Alliance Française chapters in the United States. Franks said its audience has broadened over that century. “Today, people are looking for experiences as much as education,” she said.
Registration for the Café Culturel is available through the Alliance’s website, afdepasadena.org. The Alliance can be reached at afdepasadena@gmail.com or (833) 386-3911. Information about the downtown Los Angeles event is available through Grand Performances at grandperformances.org.
“I would love people to discover that French culture is far more than stereotypes like the Eiffel Tower, croissants, or fashion. It is a living, evolving culture built on curiosity, creativity, conversation, and the pleasure of sharing ideas,” Franks said. “That spirit of openness, dialogue, and cultural exchange is what we celebrate on Bastille Day, and every other day of the year.”
