Hotels : Curated
The stone facade of a Haussmannian corner building, with wrought iron balconies, window boxes and climbing plants, photographed from the street in daylight.
Paris, France

Grand Pigalle Experimental

££
Grown-upHeritageArt-filledRecommended

Recommended by friends and by publications we trust. We have not stayed yet; it is high on our list.

29 rue Victor Massé, South Pigalle, 75009 ParisWebsite

In South Pigalle the Experimental Cocktail Club built its first hotel round a bar rather than a lobby, with martini glasses running up the stair carpet to make the point.

The smallest rooms at Grand Pigalle Experimental are 14 square metres, which leaves space for a queen bed and not much pacing. The company behind it started in the summer of 2007 with a bar on a quiet Paris street, and when it opened a hotel in 2015, in a cream-stone corner house with black iron balconies, it built the place round a bar again. Dorothée Meilichzon did the interiors in moody blues and brass, and ran martini glasses up the carpet of the spiral staircase, in case anyone forgot who owns it. The corner rooms look over the private neo-Renaissance villas of avenue Frochot, but the ones to ask for are the Under the Eaves junior suites: 26 square metres on the top floor, a porthole window, and a burnt-orange velvet headboard under a sage-green canopy. From some of them Sacré-Cœur shows over the roofs, ten minutes' climb away.

Recommended for a couple who would rather spend on dinner and a late night than on floor space. Frenchie Pigalle, Greg Marchand's restaurant, is the hotel's living room from breakfast until half past ten at night, with bacon scones, a long list of wines, orange ones included, and on Sundays a brunch after the New York fashion: eggs Benedict, and pancakes with salted caramel butter. The minibar is stocked with the Experimental Cocktail Club's own drinks, so the bar follows you upstairs. From Thursday to Saturday, Madame Arthur, Pigalle's drag cabaret, keeps two rooms dancing until dawn, after which 14 square metres looks like plenty.

The cream stone upper floors of a Haussmannian building, with wrought iron balconies, chimney pots and a clear blue sky above.
A bed with white linen and a curved orange headboard sits beneath a sage green draped canopy, in a dark blue attic room with an exposed wooden beam.
A small balcony table set with a champagne bottle, two glasses and a bowl of snacks looks out over Paris rooftops and the dome of Sacre-Coeur.
A wooden restaurant table set with two glasses of wine, a bowl of grain salad, a plate of char-grilled vegetables with herbs, and torn bread.
A rooftop terrace with orange awnings and trailing plants sits above Pigalle's rooftops, with people dining at tables in late-afternoon light.
A dimly lit bar with a crystal chandelier, exposed brick walls and timber ceiling beams, bar stools lined along a curved wooden counter.

The facts

Rooms

Rooms
37
Interconnecting
Yes
Family rooms
Yes
Sleeps up to
4

Room types

  • Sopi
  • Pigalle
  • Sopi Balcony
  • Henry Monnier
  • Grand Pigalle Corner
  • Under the Eaves

Pools

Pools
0

Food and drink

Restaurants
1
Bars
1
Worth booking
Frenchie Pigalle, chef Greg Marchand's restaurant and bar in one, which doubles as the hotel's living room and gives the Experimental Cocktail Club's drinks list a kitchen to go with it.
Children's menu
Yes
Board
Room only, Room and breakfast

Practical

Airport
Paris-Orly (ORY), about 35 minutes
Beach
No beach nearby
Lift
Yes
Step-free
Yes
Air conditioning
Yes
Parking
Yes
Dogs
No
Open
year round

Building

Converted
2015

Services

Room service
Yes
Laundry
Yes
Worth knowing
There is no organised activity beyond the restaurant and bar; the hotel's one trick is Frenchie Pigalle itself, open from breakfast through to aperitif, with a Sunday brunch it calls its nod to the New York original.

What's nearby

Place Pigalle
2 minutes, on foot
Moulin Rouge
5 minutes, on foot
Rue des Martyrs
5 minutes, on foot
Sacré-Cœur and Montmartre
10 minutes, on foot

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