Made here
Breathless
The film's long bedroom scene — close to a quarter of its running time — was shot in Room 12 in 1959, with a minimal crew and mostly natural light. The rest of the film was shot elsewhere in Paris and Marseille.
Hôtel de Suède
Standing, much changed
In, as a customer
Hôtel Les Rives de Notre-Dame
The small Left Bank hotel on the quai Saint-Michel, facing Notre-Dame, where Godard shot the long bedroom scene of Breathless in Room 12. The hotel closed in 1993; the site is now the Hôtel Les Rives de Notre-Dame.
- 15 Quai Saint-Michel, 75005 Paris
- until 1993
Illustration
The place, briefly
The Hôtel de Suède stood at 15 quai Saint-Michel, on the riverfront where the Latin Quarter meets the Seine, with Notre-Dame directly across the water. Jean-Luc Godard is reported to have lived here in the early 1950s, after returning from South America — a young critic's cheap room in the quarter of the ciné-clubs. The claim comes from a single source and is recorded here as such.
In 1959, making his first feature, Godard brought his two stars back to the hotel. Room 12 became Patricia's room in Breathless, and for close to twenty-five minutes of screen time — nearly a quarter of the film — Jean-Paul Belmondo and Jean Seberg talk, smoke, quarrel, and circle each other inside it. The crew was minimal and the lighting mostly what the windows gave. The cramped real room, chosen over any set, is as clear a statement of the New Wave's method as the jump cuts.
In 1993, the filmmakers Claude Ventura and Xavier Villetard checked into Room 12 during the hotel's final week of operation and made Chambre 12, Hôtel de Suède for Arte — a nine-day investigation that tracked down the film's surviving participants, Belmondo, cinematographer Raoul Coutard, and Claude Chabrol among them, from inside the room itself. The interior was gutted the day after they checked out. The building survived the conversion and reopened as the Hôtel Les Rives de Notre-Dame, which operates at the address today; the room the documentary preserved no longer exists.
Key facts
- 15 quai Saint-Michel, 5e — facing Notre-Dame
- Breathless (1960) — the bedroom scene, shot in Room 12 in 1959
- Godard, in the early 1950s (single-sourced)
- Chambre 12, Hôtel de Suède (Ventura & Villetard, 1993)
- 1993 — interior gutted for conversion
- Hôtel Les Rives de Notre-Dame
In images
Timeline
Godard reportedly lives at the hotel after returning from South America.
The Breathless bedroom scene is shot in Room 12 — minimal crew, window light.
Breathless opens in Paris; the small room enters film history.
Ventura and Villetard shoot Chambre 12, Hôtel de Suède in the room during the hotel's last week; the interior is gutted the day after they leave.
The building is converted; Hôtel Les Rives de Notre-Dame reopens in spring 2002.
On the map
Questions before you go
Can you stay in the Breathless hotel room?
No. Room 12 was gutted with the rest of the Hôtel de Suède's interior in 1993, when the hotel closed for conversion. The building at 15 quai Saint-Michel now operates as the Hôtel Les Rives de Notre-Dame — same site and view, different rooms.
Where was the bedroom scene in Breathless filmed?
In Room 12 of the Hôtel de Suède, 15 quai Saint-Michel, in 1959 — a real hotel room, not a set, shot with a minimal crew and mostly natural light.
Where did Michel die in Breathless?
Not near the hotel: the death scene was shot on the rue Campagne-Première in the 14e arrondissement, across the river in Montparnasse.
What is Chambre 12, Hôtel de Suède?
A 1993 documentary about the making of Breathless, directed by Claude Ventura with Xavier Villetard. La Cinémathèque française records that Ventura rented Room 12 for nine days just before the hotel's interior was destroyed, then interviewed the people who had been there in 1959 — Jean-Paul Belmondo, the director Claude Chabrol, the cinematographer Raoul Coutard, the editor Cécile Decugis and others. It runs one hour and nineteen minutes.
Was the Hôtel de Suède demolished?
No. The hotel closed in 1993 and its interior was gutted for conversion, but the building at 15 quai Saint-Michel still stands and trades today as the Hôtel Les Rives de Notre-Dame. Some accounts of the closure describe the hotel as demolished, including La Cinémathèque française's note on the documentary filmed in Room 12 that year. What was lost was the interior, Room 12 with it.
Art and film tied to this place
People who knew this place
Jean-Luc Godard
TCM's production history reports that Godard lived at the hotel after returning from South America in the early 1950s, and chose to shoot the Breathless bedroom scene there for that reason. A single source; recorded as probable until a second establishes it.
Film movement · c. 1958–1968
The French New Wave was seen here first
The young Paris critics who became directors after 1959 — Godard, Truffaut, Varda, Resnais — and the fast, cheap, personal filmmaking that changed world cinema.
Enter the movementWithin walking distance
Shakespeare and Company (Rue de la Bûcherie)
George Whitman's bookshop by the Seine — opened as Le Mistral in 1951, renamed Shakespeare and Company in 1964 with Sylvia Beach's blessing, and still sleeping writers among its shelves.
Visit the place
Boulevard Saint-Michel
The boulevard that runs from the Seine up past the Sorbonne to the Luxembourg — the main axis of the Latin Quarter, cut through by Haussmann and known for a century as the Boul'Mich. In Down and Out in Paris and London it is where a pair of Orwell's fellow lodgers ran one of the neatest frauds in the book.
Visit the place
Sainte-Chapelle
A royal chapel on the Île de la Cité, built by Louis IX in under seven years to hold the Crown of Thorns — a relic that cost more than twice what the building did. Its upper chapel has fifteen windows carrying 1,113 stained-glass scenes, two-thirds of them medieval. Open 9 a.m.–7 p.m. in summer and 9 a.m.–5 p.m. in winter; €16 for EEA visitors, €22 otherwise.
Visit the place
4 Rue de Savoie
The attic room where Blaise Cendrars settled in 1912, back from New York — his home, the address of the one-man publishing house that issued La Prose du Transsibérien, and the room he came back to after losing his arm in the war.
Visit the placeReferences
References
The sources below include histories, archival materials, scholarly research, and official records that informed this page. They document Hôtel de Suède, the people connected to it, and its place in Paris.
1BFI — In search of the locations for Jean-Luc Godard's Breathless
WebsiteBritish Film Institute, 2020Used forWeb source consulted for documented facts and historical context presented on the Hôtel de Suède page.
2The Worldwide Guide to Movie Locations — A Bout de Souffle (Breathless)
Websitemovie-locations.comUsed forWeb source consulted for documented facts and historical context presented on the Hôtel de Suède page.
3TCM — Behind the Camera: Breathless
WebsiteTurner Classic MoviesUsed forWeb source consulted for documented facts and historical context presented on the Hôtel de Suède page.
4The Criterion Collection — Breathless (1960)
WebsiteThe Criterion CollectionUsed forWeb source consulted for documented facts and historical context presented on the Hôtel de Suède page.
5Les Rives de Notre Dame — official site
WebsiteHôtel Les Rives de Notre-DameUsed forWeb source consulted for documented facts and historical context presented on the Hôtel de Suède page.
6HENRI — Chambre 12, Hôtel de Suède (Claude Ventura, 1993)
WebsiteLa Cinémathèque françaiseUsed forCinémathèque française catalogue entry for the 1993 documentary shot in Room 12, listing its runtime and interviewees.
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Why these sources are here
These references provide the documented foundation for this page's history and context. Claim-level citations remain attached to the specific claims they support.
Explore more resourcesNewsletter
Paris, one address at a time.
The cafés, studios, and walk-up flats where the work was made — one story from the map in every letter.