thograph advertisement, Robette, 1896

The absinthe ritual at the hotel bar

This stroll through time has perhaps fuelled your imagination about this period of history at the end of the 19 th and beginning of the 20 th centuries. Painters and poets lived in this “quartier” and took the “ sip of seduction” from the Muse, the enticing Green Fairy. It was an era when the very word absinthe evoked scenes of smoke-filled cafés when artists met to redesign the world. It was also a time when numerous Parisian cabarets competed with each other to recreate an atmosphere that would lure the nocturnal. Some were romantic, others sought to provoke. And some were outright anti-clerical like the cabaret “the Abbey of Thélème”.

Anticlericalism was also the tone at the former Don Juan cabaret which existed until the 1950's and which has now become the lobby of the hotel.

At the reception notice as you enter above the two steps that take you down into the lobby the painted wood panelling representing in the form of a triptych, the scene of the Annunciation to the Virgin Mary by the Archangel Gabriel. Notice as well the chimney of the lobby , which was originally open as it is today.

Humorous postcard : Suzanne Valadon serving an absinthe to Toulouse Lautrec.

Some historians claim that it is a replica of the chimney in the Chat Noir cabaret. The open hearth, typical in this era of anticlericalism in France , symbolized Hell from which appeared, through a wall of veils and silk “flames”, young dancers in very scanty dress. They were meant to spice up the atmosphere as they mingled with the clients of the Don Juan who apparently included a number of illustrious poets, painters and artists who enjoyed the show as they sipped their absinthe.