Hotel Providence Paris

Hotel Providence has taken the comptoir, the counter of the old Paris café, upstairs, and put one in each of its eighteen rooms. They are small black bars with brass rails round the shelves and an ice maker of their own, and on top stand a copper shaker and a jigger, which leaves the guest only the bartending. The building dates from 1854 and has kept its mouldings and chevron parquet; over them go velvet and furniture found at the flea markets. La Mini, at 13 square metres, is upholstered entirely in red patterned velvet, with a gold sunburst headboard: a jewel box, the hotel calls it, and it is about the size of one. Outside, rue René Boulanger is cobbled and half pedestrian, and across it is the stage door of the Théâtre du Petit Saint-Martin.

Recommended for couples who would rather have theatres outside the door than gilt on the ceiling, and a drink in the room before the curtain goes up. The Porte Saint-Martin theatres are a few steps away, and the concierge can find seats on the Grands Boulevards. The room to ask for is La Suite, under the mansard roof: 45 square metres laid out like an apartment, on a landing of its own, with a selection of LPs. Its bathroom, which the hotel calls very, very big, has a claw-foot bath and looks out to Sacré-Cœur. Downstairs the restaurant cooks with the seasons, raw or over a wood fire, beside a planted terrace of 75 square metres that the hotel calls a rare patch of green in the 10th. The piano-bar pours until one in the morning, and anyone back later than that has a bar of their own upstairs.