Le Royal Monceau, Raffles Paris – the Palace Starck reinvented

On Avenue Hoche, a few streets from the Arc de Triomphe, Le Royal Monceau has stood since 1 August 1928, when it was founded by Pierre Bermond and André Junot as a address for the writers, artists and intellectuals of Jazz Age Paris. Requisitioned during the Second World War, it hosted Eisenhower and Montgomery, and in 1948 David Ben-Gurion and Golda Meir signed the declaration of the State of Israel inside its walls. Little of that history is visible today: in 2008 the hotel closed for a complete transformation by Philippe Starck, reopening two years later as the European flagship of Raffles. The MICHELIN Guide now awards Le Royal Monceau – Raffles Paris Two Keys, its mark of an exceptional stay, while the hotel's own Il Carpaccio restaurant carries one MICHELIN star for its Italian kitchen.

01The house

Louis Duhayon designed the original building, blending neo-classical proportions with Haussmannian stone and touches of Art Nouveau, and the 1928 hotel opened with 265 rooms, gardens, a barbershop and gaming rooms for bridge and billiards. Over the decades it slipped into a comfortable slumber, respected rather than remarkable, until 2008, when its contents were auctioned and the building stripped back to its shell.

Starck's rebuild, completed in two years, kept the period façade but reinvented everything behind it: lobby sculptures, a staircase hung with dozens of chandeliers, and more than 300 works of art drawn from a private collection, overseen by curator Hervé Mikaeloff. In 2013 the hotel was awarded France's 'Palace' distinction, the state's rarest hotel classification.

02Rooms and suites

The 149 keys split across 85 rooms, 61 suites and three presidential suites, each carrying Starck's reading of the 1940s and 1950s — precise lines, noble materials, warm colour — and, in every category, an acoustic guitar left for guests who feel inspired, along with an invitation to scrawl a message on the bedside lampshade. The room collection runs from the Artist Room and Deluxe Collection Room up through Junior, Gallery, Signature, Lifestyle and Prestige Suites.

Insider tip

149 keys, Il Carpaccio (one MICHELIN star), Raffles Spa & Wellness, Le Bar Long.

Among the Unique Suites, Suite 714 is dedicated to Ray Charles, a loyal guest of the hotel with his partner Arlette Kotchounian, and still keeps a Pleyel piano for musicians who ask for it. The Penthouse Suite behaves like a private apartment with its own kitchen, while the Katara Presidential Suite, entered from 41 Avenue Hoche, adds a gym, three bedrooms and a dining room served by a private kitchen where the chefs cook on demand.

03Where to eat

Il Carpaccio has carried a MICHELIN star since the spring of 2022, when chefs Oliver Piras and Alessandra Del Favero — who met at the three-MICHELIN-starred Da Vittorio before earning their own star at Aga in the Dolomites in 2016 — took over its kitchen. Their menu is still built in partnership with the Cerea family's Da Vittorio in Brusaporto, and the restaurant's history as the first Italian establishment outside Italy to win a MICHELIN star gives the room its quiet confidence. Guests reach the tables down a corridor inlaid with thousands of mother-of-pearl shells, a tribute to the nymphs of the Italian Baroque, and pastry chefs Yazid Ichemrahen and Alexandre Favre close the meal with a dessert menu built around Italian references.

Matsuhisa Paris was Nobu Matsuhisa's first restaurant in France, and under chef Emanuele Bombardier it still plays out his signature meeting of Japanese, Peruvian and French ideas. La Cuisine, the all-day brasserie, sits beneath Stéphane Calais's ceiling fresco 'Le jardin de Paris' and a wall of backlit wine bottles, serving the hotel's buffet breakfasts and its Sunday brunch under Starck's chandeliers.

04The bar

Le Bar Long takes its name from Starck's single long, backlit aluminium counter, with a high communal table running perpendicular to it so that drinkers face one another across cocktails and tapas rather than the room. Next door, the Viñales Lounge recasts the idea of an English gentlemen's club for cigar- and spirit-lovers, an intimate retreat built for after-dinner conversation.

05Spa and wellbeing

The Raffles Spa & Wellness spreads over 1,500 square metres designed by Starck around a 23-metre pool, the longest in any Parisian palace hotel. Seven treatment rooms, a hammam, a laconium, a sauna and a Watsu bath heated to 34°C sit alongside four fitness studios with Technogym equipment and dedicated Pilates and yoga rooms fitted with Reformer and Cadillac machines.

Treatments draw on Dr Barbara Sturm, 111SKIN and Nooance, and since 28 September 2026 the spa has held the exclusive French rights to the British Dimple Amani Method, combining Brazilian lymphatic drainage with Finnish infrared therapy and Gua Sha. In October 2026 the spa and pool were listed as open daily from 6.30am to 10pm, with treatments bookable until 9pm; children may use the pool from 10am to 5pm with a parent present.

06The neighbourhood

Avenue Hoche runs almost straight from the hotel's door to the Arc de Triomphe, a short walk away, with the Champs-Élysées and the gardens of Parc Monceau equally close. The ground floor keeps a boutique run by the jeweller Mauboussin and a 99-seat screening room, the Katara Cinema, one of the first private cinemas built into a Paris hotel.

07Making the most of a stay

An art concierge arranges visits around the city's current exhibitions, and La Librairie des Arts, the hotel's own bookshop, holds more than 700 titles on art and design for browsing before or after. Once a month the Katara Cinema hosts the Royal Film Club, pairing a screening with a gastronomic dinner, and on Saturdays a buffet breakfast in La Cuisine can lead into a hatha yoga class at the spa, followed by a detox juice and free run of the pool and wellness facilities until noon.

For a weekend. For a lifetime.