Tag: pierre yves rochon

Categories
Art Design Hotels Luxury People Restaurants

Four Seasons Hotel Park Lane London + Pavyllon Restaurant Afternoon Tea

A Why for an Eye

“Time, the great surprise. The tribulations of disguise,” cries musician, fashionista and philanthropist Daphne Guinness. In contrast to the Japanese Peruvian fusion of its neighbour Nobu, Pavyllon restaurant in the Four Seasons is all about Anglo French old school glamour. Park Lane is the second most valuable address in the London edition of the board game Monopoly, only beaten by the adjacent Mayfair. Inn on the Park London which would later be renamed Four Seasons opened in 1970. It was the group’s first European hotel, having started in Toronto nine years earlier. The architect was the Austrian born American Michael Rosenauer who had offices in London and New York.

The 11 storey 193 bedroom hotel has been materially and metaphorically elevated into the 21st century by the crack team of Reardon Smith (structural rebuild), Eric Parry (rooftop spa and Presidential Suite extension), Pierre-Yves Rochon (public areas interiors), Tara Bernerd (guest rooms and suites interiors) and Chahan Minassian (Pavyllon restaurant and Bar Antoine interiors). The first stuffed morels with duxelles sweetbread were still warm when Chef Yannick Alléno scooped up a Michelin star for Pavyllon (and his own 17th), the launch of the British expression of his trademark French cooking. Daphne Guinness: “You can blow out the candle in this chimera of time to end the beginning transcending a new paradigm.”

The design of Pavyllon and the adjoining Bar Antoine are all about blocks and stripes of calming colours to generate a Parisian apartment meets London club ambience. And a touch of Manhattan sophistication: Park Avenue reborn as Park Lane. Murano chandeliers comprising interlocking Cs designed by Chahan illuminate marble and lacquered panelling to establish a sense of understated luxury. New York artist Peter Lane’s pair of ceramic stoneware sculptures in a verdigris glaze pay homage to Michael Rosenauer’s penchant for incorporating artworks into his designs. At his Grade II* Listed Time and Life Building on Bruton Street, Mayfair, completed in 1954, the architect inserted an open base relief by Henry Moore on the second floor elevation.

Born in 1961 in Lebanon, Chahan’s family moved to France when he was 15. After a stint as European Creative Director for Ralph Lauren, he launched Chahan Interior Design in 1993. “Monochromes and textures mark a lot of my interiors,” he discloses. He always has more than 20 projects on the go, involving four to eight international flights a week. “Those days get intense between site visits, overlooking floorplans and designs, planning schedules and designing along the way. No lunch breaks. I read my 350 to 450 emails on my phone and manage to coordinate answers between my team and suppliers. I dine around 10am and sleep at 2am after catching up on work reports.”

Afternoon tea in Chanan’s relaxation inducing environment might cost an arm and a leg but life is for living. A breeze of staff in sandstone hued uniforms serve pistachio then sunflower seed nibbles. The well trodden afternoon tea sequence has variations on the theme. It’s all about differentiation in London five stars, whether The Goring’s Pink Panther with its bottomless curried cauliflower sandwiches or Sanderson’s Mad Hatter’s and its cuckoo cakes. Three finger sandwiches are oak smoked salmon sandwich with shiso butter and teriyaki sauce; Hafod cheddar sandwich with tomato condiment and spring onion; and devilled egg with watercress and mayo. Petite cubic scones come with raspberry compote, orange marmalade and vanilla cream.

Pastries are apple coriander tartlet (green apple ganache, pickles, black lemon); Jaffa cake (orange, caramel); marble cake (vanilla, chocolate, gianduja); mini baba (cachaça, mint, lemon); pavlova (sugar free meringue, fruit); and vanilla caramel cookie (almond praline, hazelnut). Moonlight Yunnan white tea proves to be the perfect accompaniment to the savouries and sweets. What better way to spend a Saturday afternoon in early spring? Daphne Guinness would approve: “Life is a dance and time is the key from the dawn of creation to the twilight of humanity.”

Categories
Architecture Hotels Luxury People Restaurants

George V Hotel + L’Orangerie Restaurant Paris

Perfumed Notes | As Myrrh from the Tree

“The physical transformations of Paris can be read as a ceaseless struggle between the spirit of place and the spirit of time.” Eric Hazan

Lunch in Paris is always a good idea. Even on the city’s saddest day – Nôtre Dame is smouldering. It would be a tremendously good idea to go to a hotel with three Michelin starred restaurants one of which has three Michelin stars. Les trois pour Le Cinq. Praise be for Four Seasons George V and its most intimate offering L’Orangerie. Just 18 covers; that’s 18 seats, that’s 18 people, that’s 16 other guests. It took Head Chef David Bizet a mere eight months after opening to snap up a Michelin star. We never tyre tire of the gastronomic galaxy. We’re all dressed up (Calvin Klein | Duchamp | Vivienne Westwood) with somewhere to go.

“By the way, did you know that in Paris everyone has the best bakery at the end of their street?” Inès de la Fressange

We are swept through reception on a French flow of impossibly suave direction, past achingly orgiastic triple epiphanic inducing ceiling tipping floral arrangements – lavender’s lemon – through Le Galerie to our table d’haute. Normandy born David shares, “As someone who loves nature, it is important for me to work with the wonderful products of the French regions. My cuisine has a particular elegance and subtlety, and my take on the product can be appreciated in both its taste and visual appearance.” He further describes his cooking as “a traditional French contemporary cuisine of elegance, refinement and femininity”.

“There are little things that thrilled me more… it is one’s own discoveries – an etching in a bookstall, a crooked street in the Latin Quarter – a quaint church in some forgotten corner, these are all the things one remembers.” Samuel Barber

The interior of L’Orangerie is as starry as its culinary accreditation: a crystalline prism presents a welcome foil to the solidity of Lefranc + Wybo’s original Art Deco white stone architecture. Designer Pierre-Yves Rochon used 2.5 tonnes of glass, 160,000 pieces of Carrara marble and a few Lalique lamps to up the ante, to max the effect, to dazzle with pizzazz. L’Orangerie overlooks the Marble Courtyard; it’s perpendicular to Le Cinq and opposite Le George (the third restaurant). We could easily get distracted by this visual feast and that’s before the feast on (textured, sculptured and abstract) plates arrives. There’s a new axis tilting lunch menu and Charles, the Monsieur Divay variety, Directeur of L’Orangerie and Le Galerie is here to explain, “We’ve more vegetables and seafood on our new menu.” Fantastique! We want to savour the vegan and pescatarian savouries.

Incidentally, the sixth Michelin Guide published by André Michelin, the 1926 edition, set out its raison d’être: “For a certain number of important cities in which the tourist may expect to stop for a meal we have indicated restaurants that have been called to our attention for good food.” Restaurants were graded in three categories, as they are today, from one star “simple but well run” to three stars “restaurants of the highest class”. La Tour d’Argent was one of the first Parisian restaurants to achieve the ultimate recognition.

“All of the sadness of the city came suddenly with the first cold rains of winter… but now it’s spring… Paris is a moveable feast.” Ernest Hemingway

Very incidentally, second floor apartments attract a premium in Paris. Much of the city was rebuilt in the 19th century under the direction of Georges-Eugène Haussmann. A uniformity of design meant the ground floor of blocks was usually commercial with the shopkeepers housed immediately upstairs. The wealthy lived on the second floor or “étage noble”. Far enough from street noise but not too many stairs to climb. The most generously sized apartments with high ceilings and long balconies are still on this floor. Monsieur Haussmann blessed Paris with four square streets of gold, a little bit of heaven come early. The lost and found generation. Paris is always worth it. Sequins of events on a glittering grid.

“The copper dark night sky went glassy over the city crowned with signs and starting alight with windows, the wet square like a lake at the front of the station ramp.” Elizabeth Bowen