75005 Travel Guide
Tags: Hotels With iMacs / Paris Hotel Scene / Hotel Technology / → All Tags
A New-Style Hotel in the Old Latin Quarter
Finding a decent hotel in Paris without shelling out a mint of euros has gotten harder and harder, even in the economic downturn. That’s why it’s so exciting to come across a new entry like the Hotel Sorbonne right in the shadow of the Pantheon in Paris’s fifth arrondisement.
The hotel’s façade is still undergoing a bit of renovation, so rooms in the front can be a little noisy, but this is Paris, what are you doing sitting around in your hotel room anyway? Besides, the cleaning should be done any day now, so go ahead and book it. And if you need a further incentive, um...look at what's on the desk in the hotel rooms. Yeah, we're thinking the same thing. Oooh la la.
Tags: Paris Hotel Scene / HotelChatter Reviews / Boutique Hotels / Art Hotels / → All Tags
Inside The Five Hotel in Paris
A while back we asked you readers to Pick a Hotel for HotelChatter in Paris and while we would have loved to stay at the Plaza Athenee or the George V, our budgets decided on a more affordable option in the Fifth Arrondissement called The Five Hotel. The hotel was a suggestion from reader WallaceGirl who totally went dark on us when we tried to contact her about "winning." Go figure.
But still we anticipated our stay at The Five Hotel all trip long. When we finally arrived in Paris for our last night, we headed straight to The Five Hotel. It's on a tiny little street called Rue de Flatters. And we mean tiny.
Tiny is also a good word to use when describing The Five. But in this case, tiny doesn't necessarily mean bad.
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We've Picked a Hotel in Paris!
Thanks to all the commenters who dropped in their suggestions for Paris. In the end there was a three-way tie between the The Petit Moulin, Plaza Athenee and the write-in suggestion from PatrickSW, The Four Seasons George V.
So, here is how we operated the tie-breaker. The George V was about $1,200 a night. Last time we checked, our bank account barely held that much money in it and a large portion of it was already ear-marked for our expensive shoe habit.
But speaking of shoes, the Plaza Athenee offers a chocolate shoe if you book the Sex and The City package. Yay! However, our chocolate rush was over before it began as the Plaza Athenee has room rates topping out at $900 a night. There's just no way we could get that budget approved from our bosses. Believe us, we tried.
Tags: VIP Hotel Reviewer Series / Ben Mandelker / Paris Hotel Guide / Budget Hotels / → All Tags
TV Buff Finds Cheap Lodging in the Heart of Paris' Latin Quarter
We now present you with our VIP Hotel Reviewer Series in which we hand-pick experts in the travel and media worlds and beyond to tell us what are their favorite hotels and why. Once a week, we'll feature a hotel review from said VIPs about their favorite leisure or business hotels. Pay attention: These VIPs are experts at what they do and they don't mess around when it comes to their hotels.
The next VIP in the series is Ben Mandelker, co-founder of the popular TV blog TVgasm.com. These days he's toiling away as a screenwriter in Los Angeles--ok, so maybe not toiling right this moment--but he is writing the B-Side Blog and he's been tapped to write the remake of "Easy Money" for MGM Studios. Enjoy.
Exchange rates haven't been friendly to American tourists in Paris, but luckily, it's still possible to find cheap lodging in the heart of the city. Take, for example, the Hotel du Mont Blanc. Located smack in the middle of the Latin Quarter, this two-star hotel is walking distance from some of the city's biggest attractions: the Louvre, Notre Dame, and the Jardin du Luxembourg, to name a few.
More importantly, it's mere footsteps away from the Place Saint-Michel Metro Station, which doubles as a stop for the RER, making airport trips -- not to mention excursions to Versailles -- a breeze (trains to Charles De Gaulle, Orly, and Versailles all pass through this specific station).
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Stayin' Sexy at Paris' Five Hotel
After last week's low-budget hotel review, the New York Times sent Sarah Wildman to The Five Hotel in Paris. The place has sort of an NHow Hotel thing going on, with the planetarium-style lighting and sassy decor.
You better like the scene too, since you probably won't be lounging around your room:
To call room 203, in the lowest price category, small would be generous. The bed, pushed into a corner, almost entirely filled the space...The bathroom -- triangular and fitted as for a dollhouse -- was fine for a woman of about 5 ft 3 inches (me), but uncomfortable for anyone ganglier.
Hmmm...sounds like the Times "sprung" for the cheapest room at the place. Other floors have bigger and better rooms--including one with a bed hanging from the ceiling on steel cables. Now that is sexy!
Related Stories:
· Paris: The Five Hotel [NYT]
· NHow Hotel Keeps Boutique Trend Alive [HotelChatter]
· Starry Nights, Swinging Beds, and Personalized Scents [HotelChatter]
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Starry Nights, Swinging Beds, and Personalized Scents
We understand why the CoolHunter is so cool. They seem to have their finger on the pulse of hip European hotels. Like Paris' super hip and brand spankin' new, Five Hotel.
This place is definitely unusual with its swinging bed and signature scents. Plus it boasts a Saint-Germain-des-Prés `hood address which in itself, deems the place as cool.
As for the hotel decor--its scents and the color scheme--well that's all up to you:
The newly opened Parisian hotel, The Five Hotel, offers 5 aromatized signatures: gourmand, tonic, relaxed, natural and sensual.... You may select the fragrance that most appeals to your mood of the day that will be softly diffused in you room combined with your own chosen associated optic fiber color environment.
The Five Hotel has smoothly integrated optical fiber lighting, adding a touch of lucidity and decor: incorporated into the bathroom tiling and bedroom ceilings, a dream innovation, scintillating the magical and romantic atmosphere.... Here you sleep under the star lit sky!
With just nine rooms, each has a different theme color and from there its design is spawned. Although their web site features some nice shots of the rooms, no information is really available as to the amenities. So WiFi may be a no go and they just might expect the starry lit room to make up for it. That would be so French.
Related Stories:
· The Five Hotel [The CoolHunter]
· Five Hotel Reviews [TripAdvisor]
Tags: Paris Hotel Reviews / Hotel Staff / → All Tags
A Friendly But Cramped Hotel in the City of Light
Finding the perfect hotel in Paris isn't an easy task. Sure it's easy to find hotels with a great location, total luxury, and/or the latest trends. But to get everything combined into one package along with happy and friendly service is damn near impossible.
And by service, we mean American style service as this is the main problem between the Frogs and the Americans. What is classified as good service over there usually doesn't cut it `round here.
Hotel Agora in the upscale and lively St. Germain neighborhood comes pretty close to meeting one's needs. Its address proves handy for anyone's visit to Paris and on top of that the service is friendly. Yep, friendly!
Managing assistant Marco Paulo Da Rocha greeted our extended family of seven with a rich "bonjour," before switching unbidden to fluent English. Hotel Agora is Marco Paulo's baby, and at times it seems like a one-man show. He has some help: a couple of friendly desk clerks fill in during nights and weekends, while a bubbly young woman and a shy older lady run the breakfast cafe and keep rooms reasonably tidy.
The recent renovations have added flat-screen TVs to the rooms while the irreplaceable old-world amenities still exist such as balconies that overlook an ancient church and bustling Parisian streets filled with scents from the nearby boulangerie.
The catch? It's small as hell (though that's par for the course in this city). The elevator states it holds three and the reviewer claims this must mean three parakeets. "Double beds" prove more the size of cots and are so close to the next bed they may as well just combine to be one larger specimen.
Even so, one has to be willing to take a step back in Paris and size isn't such a bad one in this case since rooms start at just $166.
Related Stories:
· Warm welcome at this cozy Paris hotel [Mercury News]
· Hotel Agora St. Germain Reviews [TripAdvisor]
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Room With a View: Hotel des Grands Hommes
Paris--yeah, yeah, big deal. Who hasn't done Paris? There is always talk about favorite hotels near the Champs Elysees, just off the Eiffel Tower, or St. German des Pres. So for your next Parisian stay, why not get in the real spirit of true French culture and choose your hotel based on an artist's photograph?
We love that other nation's hotel blogs love to brag about pools and cocktail choices. But French blog, Hotels Rive-Gauche, "aiment la photographie", they love it so much that they spotlighted Frank Beloncle this month and his artistic shot from the window of a room in the Hotel des Grands Hommes. The room with a view provides an up-close and personal look at the Pantheon (place where dead people are buried). The hotel has all the charm one would expect of a Parisian hotel; breakfast terrace off the rooms, antiques, well-dressed staff. But don't forget that that is not why you are choosing this hotel. You are choosing this hotel because you saw a moody photograph from an inspired artiste, taken from one of its chambres.
Beloncle explains the passion he felt from the room, and when you explain your hotel choice, we advise sticking to his script (to sound all the more in-the-know):
In this blue room, I felt at home. So close to the enormous monument (Pantheon). So close, that it brought me much pleasure having it by my side during the night.
As you sit in Café de Flore with a cigarette and dressed in head to toe black, remember to say with a pout when asked your hotel, that you chose the Hotel Grands Hommes because that blue room next to the Pantheon filled your soul with a certain...je ne sais quoi.
Related Stories:
· Hotels Rive-Gauche aiment La Photograhie [Hotels Rive Gauche]
· Hotel des Grands Hommes Reviews [TripAdvisor]
Tags: Hotel News / → All Tags
Residence Henri IV
Résidence Henri IV is a small, friendly hotel with little balconies that face a small park. It is a few blocks from Notre Dame and very convenient to the Sorbonne and the student district of the Left Bank with lots of little restaurants and food shops nearby. We took a suite with two small rooms, a big bathroom and tiny kitchen. Seems pricey at $250 but for four of us, tres bon marche for Paris. The elegant touches, nice lobby and really good people made our stay a pleasure. One mid-night we woke to a rowdy in-line skate race of thousands speeding by in the rain, a fun surprise.
The Hôtel Résidence Henri IV honors year round promotional rates.
Contact info:
Hôtel Résidence Henri IV
50 rue des Bernadins
75005 Paris
France
Tel: +33 (0)1.44.41.31.81
Fax : +33 (0)1.46.33.93.22
E-mail: reservation@residencehenry4.com
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