Hôtel Balzac Is Paris Fashion Week’s New Best-Kept Secret | Vogue

"Located on Rue Balzac in a sweet but sleepy corner of the 8th arrondissement, mere steps from the bustling Champs-Élysées, this 58-room, well-appointed Haussmannian establishment sits on the site of the hôtel particulier where Honoré de Balzac housed his paramour, the Polish countess Ewelina Hańska. Designed by Charlotte de Tonnac and Hugo Sauzay of Festen, the spaces show an elegant, restrained eye—an Art Deco–inspired and Japanese-influenced haven with a palette of varying shades of mocha, from latte to cortado to espresso. During fashion week it was accommodating to editors but not a scene: you could actually spill the tea in the Earl Grey–hued breakfast room without looking over your shoulder, while habitués clustered in the sky-lit lounge over a platter of Ibérico bellota and complex house cocktails named for Balzac works such as Comédie Humaine, a shochu and jasmine concoction; when I joined in pajamas, it felt like a fashion sleepover in the chicest dortoir." - Chloe Malle