Even with The Ritz and Crillon currently unavailable and being renovated, there’s no shortage of 5-star hotels in Paris Le Bristol, the Meurice, and Plaza Athenee to name few. Regardless, come August 1, 2014, the iconic Asian brand of Peninsula joins the elite list.
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Pooka and I had dinner with the new hotel’s sales manager Isabelle Bouvier recently at the Mercury restaurant in Dallas. She was in town with a flock international Peninsula managers, all chic and elegant in black, black, black, and charcoal grey dresses and suits.
“They wear black, ” Pooka whispered to me, “to set off the vibrantly colored roses, tulips, and other centerpiece flowers on the long dinner table.” Pooka would know.
We learned from Isabelle that the Peninsula Paris is in a once-decaying Belle Époque building. The hotel’s 200 rooms are being renovated at a cost well in excess of $2.75 million, according to the Wall Street Journal. As impressive as the dollar figures are, the building’s history is more so. For example, when known as the Majestic hotel, in 1922, Proust, Picasso, Joyce, Stravinsky, and Diaghilev gathered for a legendary dinner party. George Gershwin composed much of An American in Paris here. It was the headquarters of the German military during WWII, and the site for the Paris Peace Accords to end the Vietnam War. Whew.
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Because of the construction, all we saw were drawings, but Pooka will be there early in September in person to see first-hand if the buzz lives up to the reality. Knowing Peninsula, you can count on it.
To paraphrase the website, the lobby is the heart of all Peninsula hotels. In Paris, there are meticulously restored soaring curved ceilings, with bespoke chandeliers that reflect the tree-lined streets outside, and elegant contemporary furnishings, blending the best of French craftsmanship of yesteryear and today.
The Cigar Lounge features original frescos on the ceiling, revived by the famous restoration team from the Louvre Museum.
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