Chasing Balzac: Uncovering the Intimate Belle Epoque Hotels of Paris

In Paris, the most striking hotels are not always the largest. Or the grandest. On my visits to the City of Light, I am drawn to smaller, tucked-away edifices — most of them private mansions, many with ivy-kissed courtyards. These intimate 19th-century lodgings offer Belle Époque charm and top-drawer amenities. For me, they evoke the high society of turn-of-the-century Paris and the grandeur of those times.

Although the nattily attired dandies and haughty aristocrats (for the most part) have faded into history, their mansions have survived, offering would-be bons vivants and lovers of 19th-century French literature the kind of accommodations that recall the raconteur-filled salons chronicled in the novels of Honoré de Balzac.

Less predictable than the classic luxury hotel, these locations, with their lack of crowds (most have just a handful of rooms in a town house) and their feels-like-home ambience (if you were, say, a duke), invite tourists to feel more honored guest than paying patron.

The location of La Réserve Paris is best described as in the thick of it. The mansion in the style of Baron Georges-Eugène Haussmann, the architect celebrated for reimagining modern Paris, is in the stylish Eighth Arrondissement, on Avenue Gabriel overlooking the Grand Palais, Eiffel Tower and Place de la Concorde’s towering obelisk.

Over cocktails in the jewel-toned salon, reading in the interior courtyard, lounging in your sleek yet sumptuously appointed room, it’s not difficult to conjure the image of the Duke de Morny (Napoléon III’s half brother who owned the mansion from 1854 to 1888) leaning over the wrought iron balconies, gazing at the sunset.

Reimagined as La Réserve in 2015 with interiors by noted designer Jacques Garcia, the 40 large rooms (26 are suites) have kitted-out marble bathrooms (heated floors, Toto Japanese toilet) and luxurious accents like Quagliotti linens, separate robes for bathing (fluffy) and lounging (brushed cotton) and a walk-in mini bar area brimming with made-in-Paris chocolates, wines and juices. The hotel also has a pool and small spa.

Amid the fashionable shops of Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré, Élysée Palace (residence of the French president) and the bustling gardens rimming Champs-Élysées, Hotel Splendide Royaloffers a perk: the ability to forget that you are in the heart of the Eighth Arrondissement, the city’s main artery. The 12 suites of this revamped town house (opened as a hotel in 2017) drip bel interieur Parisien with a restrained cream-and-white palette and floor-to-ceiling windows.

The oversize bathroom, generous closets and dressing area are convenient for guests who spend weeks there at a time. Another boon? Snappy service: My morning coffee arrived in under 10 minutes. Downstairs, it’s cozy; a single desk for check-in, an art-filled salon for fireside cocktails or coffee and a door that connects to the hotel’s Italian restaurant Tosca.

— L’Hotel

Amid the narrow streets of the Left Bank, close to the Latin Quarter’s jazz clubs and bookshops and profiting from the youthful glow of the Sorbonne, L’Hotel exudes the bohemian spirit of St. Germain-des-Prés. This 20-room hotel, tucked into rue des Beaux Arts,delivers a theatrical brand of opulence along with a juicy history. Erected in 1828 on the palace grounds of Queen Margaret of Valois (first wife of Henry IV), the property began as a boardinghouse and evolved into a hotel, first Hotel d’Allemagne in 1868 and then in 1870 to Hotel d’Alsace, which attracted literary types (Oscar Wilde and Jorge Luis Borges were residents).

Once recast as L’Hotel in the 1960s, it became watering hole de choix for glitterati, including Spanish painterSalvador Dalí and Jean Cocteau,the French poet, dramatist, screenwriter and novelist. It was home to Serge Gainsbourg, the irreverent French singer-songwriter, and British actress Jane Birkin, and a luxurious Parisian perch for Frank Sinatra, Elizabeth Taylor, Mick Jagger and Jim Morrison of The Doors who famously attempted to commit suicide by tossing himself from a first floor window only to land on the roof of a parked car.

Fin-de-siècle glamour runs from the top floor Cardinal’s Suite down the leopard carpeted spiral stairway to Le Bar where tufted velvet chairs, vintage barware and an outré vibe attract a nightly crowd of locals. Rooms, with names like Saint-Pétersbourg, Marco Polo and Mata Hari, are flamboyant, furnished to reflect their inspirations. Start or end the day in the candlelit subterranean plunge pool and hammam steam room.

In Montmartre, on quaint Avenue Junotfar from the tourist traps surrounding the hilltop church of Sacré Cœur, the former home of the Hermes family was transformed 11 years ago into a quirky hotel with five suites. Each suite was individually designed by artists hand-picked by the owner, interior designer Morgane Rousseau.

The 10th Arrondissement is the Brooklyn of Paris: edgy and brimming with chic millennials picnicking along a canal that snakes through the area. Hotel Providence, on rue René Boulanger, sits at the intersection of Haut Marais and Canal St.-Martin — two of Paris’s most trendy neighborhoods. Opened in 2015, the hotel draws a fashionable clientele that is a far cry from its original incarnation — a brothel.

Affordable and stylish, its 18 rooms read stylish friend’s pied-à-terre, a lively trifecta of House of Hackney wallpaper, retro seating and a mini cocktail-making kit. Cool kids — and aging ones — lounge in the ground-floor salon plotting out the day’s activities (often featuring a visit to Rue Montorgeuil, a charming street chock a block withbutcher shops, florists, cheesemongers and Paris’ first bakery, Stohrer).

The hotel has a lovely restaurant and a leafy terrace cafe that offers front row seating to the grungy-glam stage of the 10th Arrondissement.