Park Hyatt Paris-Vendôme

The jewellery houses of Rue de la Paix keep some of the most expensive windows in Europe, and from inside the hotel there is no sign of any of it. The entrance is discreet, the interiors are low-lit and full of art, and the first impression is of a very good private apartment rather than a hotel a minute from Place Vendôme.

That restraint is the design. Rooms face either the street or a courtyard, and the courtyard side is close to silent for an address this central. Limestone bathrooms with separate showers and soaking tubs come with the Park Rooms, and balcony categories add outdoor space. PUR’, under Jean-François Rouquette, is the serious table. Café Jeanne runs from breakfast through to cocktails without changing character, and SEOK brings Korean cooking into a building that takes it entirely in its stride.

Between Vendôme and the Opéra

The address puts Place Vendôme at one end of the street and the Palais Garnier at the other, with the jewellery houses in between and the Tuileries a short walk beyond. It is a stretch of Paris built entirely for arriving well. The hotel’s own entrance is the exception, deliberately quiet, so the transition from the most theatrical street in the city to a hushed interior takes about four steps.

Street side or courtyard side

Rooms and suites are furnished as a collector might furnish them, with contemporary work set against classical Parisian bones and limestone bathrooms that keep the shower and the soaking tub apart. The real decision is orientation. Rue de la Paix gives movement, light and the sense of being in the middle of things; the courtyard gives a quiet that central Paris rarely offers. Balcony categories add outdoor space, and the apartment goes further again.

PUR’, Café Jeanne, SEOK

PUR’ is the reason to keep an evening free, with Jean-François Rouquette cooking in a room designed to put guests close to the work rather than at a polite distance from it. Café Jeanne is the everyday counterpart, moving from breakfast through lunch to cocktails without changing character. SEOK adds Korean cooking to the building. Le Spa handles the rest, with a jetted tub, a sauna, a steam room and treatment rooms.