Hôtel des Saints Pères

In 1658, architect Daniel Gittard built this house on rue des Saints-Pères for himself. He lived on the top floor and rented out the rest. Gittard worked for Louis XIV and helped build Saint-Sulpice, so the hotel began as the home of a man who was also shaping the surrounding city. Its balanced classical façade, carved pediments, bas-reliefs and exposed beams belong to that older building.^[3][1]

The most remarkable discovery came after Esprit de France founder Christophe Paluel-Marmont and the hotel’s manager acquired the building in the early 1980s. During the works, a false ceiling was opened to reveal a seventeenth-century fresco measuring eight metres by five. It lay in a first-floor room once occupied by royal adviser Pierre Abraham, Lord of Charange. According to Esprit de France’s account, the painting had survived so well beneath its covering that only the varnish needed cleaning.^[3]

The ceiling shows Good Omen crowned by Virtue and Intelligence, with a star above Intelligence illuminating the scene. Esprit de France attributes the work to the School of Versailles; the individual painter has not been established. The fresco is now the defining feature of the Signature Junior Suite. Guests who want to sleep beneath it should reserve that particular suite.^[3][2]

The hotel later became a place artists returned to. Its own history names painter Francis Bacon, singer and actress Juliette Gréco, pianist Alfred Brendel and fashion designer Tom Ford among its patrons. Those connections sit alongside art that is still part of a stay: seventeenth- and eighteenth-century paintings and engravings, antiques, and rooms looking onto the planted courtyard.^[1]