It has just 26 rooms, each named after a famous author – Jean-Jacques Rousseau to Virginia Woolf. Their books line the shelves next to the bed; their best quotes stencilled on the walls. Another charming touch is that guests can fill out a form about their reading tastes and the hotel will bring up a novel before bedtime, like a literary prescription.
Novelists, poets and artists have long flocked to Paris. There’s a romance about its white churches, strong coffee and revolutionary history that attracts creative types as well as honeymooning couples.
So what better place to stay than a literary hotel drawing on the city’s history of philosophers and writers.
At Le Pavillon des Lettres guests can fill out a form about their reading tastes and the hotel will bring up a novel before bedtime, like a literary prescription
Pavillon des Lettres is brimming with fashionable tomes about art, architecture and design
Nestled on a quiet arrondissement – surrounded by cafes and designer boutiques – it is the height of chic
The hotel is a stone’s throw from the Champs-Élysées – and affords guests views of a certain famous metal tower
One might imagine such a hotel to be bohemian but Le Pavillon des Lettres is anything but. Nestled on a quiet arrondissement – surrounded by cafes and designer boutiques – it is the height of chic. A stone’s throw from the Champs-Élysées, its slick entrance is fronted by perfectly coiffed topiary bushes.
Downstairs a log fire sits below a bookshelf stacked with fashionable tomes about art, architecture and design.
The bedrooms are plush, decorated in muted beiges, pigeon greys and deep purples.
The bathrooms are all black slate and glass and a box of truffles awaits your arrival on crisp white sheets. It’s possible to order breakfast – a huge tray of croissants fresh from a local patisserie plus jams, yoghurt and fruit – to eat in bed. For those who feel like getting dressed, a hot buffet it is also served in the salon downstairs.
The hotel can arrange for a French teacher to come and give you classes so you can perfect the so-called language of love.
Our teacher was also a tour guide and took us around the beautiful St Germain area to practice our skills on unsuspecting waiters.
The bedrooms are plush, decorated in muted beiges, pigeon greys and deep purples
The hotel can arrange for a French teacher to come and give you classes so you can perfect the so-called language of love
The hotel, pictured, can hire a pho tography expert to take you around the city and show you how to make your snaps extra Instagrammable
Two famous cafés on the main square – Café Les Deux Magots and Café de Flore – were favourite haunts of Hemingway, Jean Jacques Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir and Picasso. Nowadays, the area is gentrified.
Gucci and Louis Vuitton have taken over the grand bibliothèques that once housed thousands of books and expensive patisseries selling colourful macarons, chocolates and designer éclairs are aplenty.
The hotel can also hire a photography expert to take you around the city and show you how to make your snaps extra Instagrammable.
If sunny, take a walk along the Seine to see stalls touting second-hand books or watercolour paintings.
The museum dedicated to French sculptor Auguste Rodin is also nearby, with his work – from kissing lovers to demons crawling at the gates of hell – scattered around the garden outside.
In the evening, a five-minute walk from the hotel is Market, a French-Asian fusion restaurant serving up ornate sushi and eastern twists on gallic classics. After a weekend’s stay you’re sure to return well-rested, brimming with culture and full of joie de vivre.
TRAVEL FACTS
A one night stay at Le Pavillon des Lettres costs from €330 based on two sharing a Superior Room on a bed and breakfast basis. Eurostar runs 21 daily services from London St. Pancras International to Paris Gare Du Nord.
Fares start from £29 one way based on a return journey. For more information and to book tickets visit eurostar.com or call 03448 224 777.
