In 1920, the farmer Paul Roux opened a café with a dance terrace in Saint-Paul-de-Vence. Léger, Braque, Matisse, Chagall and Picasso exchanged art for food and lodging – and the works still hang on the walls today.
In this story · 6 sections
"Here we welcome those who arrive on horseback, on foot or with paintings." The sign still hangs at La Colombe d'Or in Saint-Paul-de-Vence, and it is no joke. During the 20th century, some of the era's greatest artists paid for food and lodging with their works, and they remain on the walls today.
The hotel is still owned by the Roux family, now in its third generation. It is a small house with 25 rooms and suites: an inn in a hilltop village, with an art collection that has grown over a century.
La Colombe d'Or
- Address
- Place du Général-de-Gaulle, 06570 Saint-Paul-de-Vence
- Founded
- 1920 (as Chez Robinson)
- Founders
- Paul and Titine Roux
- Owner
- The Roux family, third generation
- Rooms
- 25 rooms and suites
- Art
- Léger, Braque, Calder, Matisse, Chagall and Picasso, among others
01Paul Roux and Chez Robinson
In 1920, when Paul Roux came home from the First World War, the local farmer opened a café with an outdoor terrace where people danced at weekends. It was called Chez Robinson. Together with his wife Titine, he extended the place and reopened it as La Colombe d'Or – according to Something Curated, a small inn with three rooms.
The façade was assembled from stones from an old castle in Aix-en-Provence, and the architect Jacques Couëlle designed a fireplace with handprints of those who helped build the house.
02Artists who paid with paintings
When the south of France became the free zone in 1940, many artists and writers made their way from Paris to the Côte d'Azur, and several of them found their way to Roux. According to The Rake and Something Curated, Fernand Léger, Georges Braque, Alexander Calder, Bernard Buffet, Henri Matisse, Marc Chagall and Pablo Picasso, among others, exchanged works for food and lodging.
On the terrace sits a work by Léger with the house's dove, and by the pool hangs a mobile by Calder. The latest addition is a large ceramic piece by the Irish-born artist Sean Scully. The poet Jacques Prévert came here during a film shoot, stayed on and became a close friend of Paul Roux.
03Guests in the guest book
The guest book is a story in itself. The Rake mentions Charlie Chaplin, Orson Welles, Jean-Paul Belmondo, Alain Delon and François Truffaut, and later Michael Caine, Roger Moore, Jack Nicholson, Bono and Leonardo DiCaprio.
04Rooms and terrace
The rooms are furnished with antiques, textiles and tapestries, and each one is different from the others. Breakfast is eaten on the terrace, and the pool in the courtyard has Calder's mobile hanging above it.
The restaurant serves Provençal cuisine that, according to The Rake, has largely remained unchanged since Paul Roux put together the menu: grilled sardines, aubergine, couscous and oven-baked gilt-head bream, with the house rosé to accompany.
05Saint-Paul-de-Vence and Vence
La Colombe d'Or is located at the entrance to the walled village. The Fondation Maeght is just outside, and the neighbouring town of Vence has Matisse's Chapelle du Rosaire. Plan the visit with our 48 hours in Saint-Paul-de-Vence. More about the coast and the hinterland can be found in VERA PI's guide to the French Riviera, and we gather more Riviera destinations at metromode.co.
06How to visit La Colombe d'Or
Book rooms well in advance – the house is small. Even those not staying here can dine on the terrace and see the art, but the table must be booked. Come early in the morning or late in the evening to experience the village without day-trippers.
