Superlatives abound at BVLGARI HOTEL PARIS – and even Monica Vitti is smiling, as is hotel MD Sylvain Ercoli, above.
This place is the 76-room centre of style, in the hub of Paris fashion-land, at the junction of avenue George V and Pierre 1er de Serbie, directly opposite Four Seasons George V. What was once an office block has been completely re-done, with Antonio Citterio Patricia Viel interiors.
Inside Bvlgari’s main door, Monica Vitti – a lifesize portrait, admittedly, by Yan Pei-Ming – is indeed smiling. To get a quick overview, glide around the ground floor in an anti-clockwise, through the lobby lounge, to a bijou terrace, oh so dolce vita. Thanks to standing heaters, dine here, year-round. All-round, glorious low-hung trees are highlighted in Broadway style.
Food is designed by Bvlgari’s Michelin-starred partner, Nico Romito, and gorgeous. The ideal would be to share an antipasti, two consecutive servings, each three different tantalizing tastes. Then go veal Milanaise, no uniform flattened slab but, here, a light-as-air high shape. For Rosé, Ercoli would choose a 2021 Pétale de Rose from Régine Sumeire, a friend from his St-Tropez days (this is a self-professed humble hotelier who is incredibly loyal, to friends as well as business partners and his team).
Girlahead would sum up the whole experience as minutely considered. Everything. There’s super-spacious fitness, a 23-metre pool, and the five spa products include 111skin.
Bvlgari Paris could be aptly described as a temple of superlatives. Girlahead’s suite, the 125sq m #701, had no less than 189 brand-new hardbacks, chosen by Atelier 27 and all immediately exciting. The 1,000 sq m Penthouse, #901, has its own gym, a modernist piano (French summit-tech Alpange), a flame-look fire, and dining for ten. Its two bedrooms have, as in all the rooms, a bathroom decoration, a metre-high Lalique-look serpent, a signature shape of Bulgari, the jeweller. Climb the Penthouse’s 20 silk-smooth pale wood stairs to the rooftop, your private arboretum, tennis-court size. Propose up there, in its gazebo. Or simply order breakfast.
It’s the same, up there or down in, or outside, the restaurant. Go Corbeille francaise – or Corbeille italienne. If you go Italian the result includes six different breads set in military order on a hotel-logo wood tray, plus a trio of Niko Romito jams – and Beurre Echiré butter, Ferme de Peupliers yoghurt, and Illy coffee. Bvlgari style, French-Italian best.
They think of everything. Order a sandwich to take on Eurostar and it arrives, five minutes before departure, with all accompaniments. It is brought by a Sartorialist in pine green suit. As we go downstairs he enthuses about how the hotel treats its team, a rise for everyone eight months after opening, a tunning team party on a Seine boat. No wonder people want to work at Bvlgari Hotel Paris. No wonder Monica is always smiling.
