Hôtel de Crillon has mastered a rare combination: serious Parisian glamour and a genuinely brilliant family stay.
There are hotels you approach with a six-year-old feeling entirely relaxed. Hôtel de Crillon, all pale stone, gilt and 18th-century grandeur on the Place de la Concorde, is not necessarily one of them.
Built at the request of Louis XV, the Crillon has occupied one of Paris’s most imposing addresses for more than two centuries, its neoclassical façade looking across the Place de la Concorde towards the Tuileries. Monarchs, artists and assorted luminaries have passed through its doors; from Marie Antoinette, who learnt to play the piano here, to Karl Lagerfeld, who later put his own stamp on two of its Grands Appartements.
And yet, shortly after arriving, we found a tipi pitched in our bedroom, a bouquet of balloons, a hamper of beautifully chosen toys and jars of candy dotted about. Our daughter was delighted.
This is the other side of the Crillon: a palace hotel that takes children seriously.
Palace life, with children
Crillon’s family offering, Le Petit Crillon, begins in the room. A knock at the door: Benny, a small elephant and the hotel’s mascot, arrives alongside colouring books, games and activities, while an unassuming tipi is already set up creating a little play den. There are child-sized bath ponchos and, for smaller guests, all the essentials parents would rather not squeeze into a suitcase: bibs, sleep sacks and crib bumpers.
Downstairs in the hotel’s restaurants, the children’s menu is sophisticated, while still appealing to even the fussiest of eaters (mine included). For €40, little diners can choose a main course, dessert and drink, with dishes including coquillettes with ham and cheese and grilled salmon. Afternoon tea has been miniaturised too: €28 brings pastries by pastry chef Matthieu Carlin, served with hot chocolate or juice, plus colouring and games to buy parents a little more time at the table.
Breakfast, down to the minute
Breakfast here is exceptional.
Served in Jardin d’Hiver, the Crillon’s all-day dining room and a suitably grand place to begin the morning. It is an elegant, light-filled cocoon of marble, mirrors and chandeliers.
Breakfast comes with the Crillon treatment. Order boiled eggs and you’ll be asked exactly how many minutes you’d like them cooked.
Five? Six? Seven?
Unsurprisingly, the egg appears exactly as requested.
It is one of those tiny hotel moments that tells you rather more than any amount of talk about five-star service.
Everything is cooked to order. Eggs come from La Ferme du Pré in Normandy, fruit and vegetables from Dorian Gautier and cheeses from La Ferme d’Alexandre. There are truffled scrambled eggs, boiled eggs with caviar, avocado on Viking bread, pancakes, crêpes, bowls of berries and French toast.
Croissants, pains au chocolat, baguettines and the bakery of the day arrive in a basket, the croissants so flaky that the murmur of the dining room is periodically interrupted by the crackle of pastry and a scattering of crumbs across the white linen.
The €65 American breakfast covers pastries, fruit and eggs with two sides with Paris ham, smoked salmon, bacon, avocado, mushrooms or sautéed potatoes among the options. At €95, the Chic breakfast dispenses with restraint: a mimosa followed by either caviar-topped boiled eggs or scrambled eggs with black truffle.
The French toast is a must, while the hot chocolate is gloriously decadent.
More impressively, breakfast remained a pleasure with a child at the table. There was colouring, conversation from the team and never any sense that little ones need to hurry along. We happened to mention that the only fruit our daughter would eat was an apple with the skin removed; minutes later, a plate of perfectly peeled and sliced apples appeared.
The Louvre, with a mission
Even outside of the hotel, the Crillon is unusually good at making Paris itself work for younger visitors.
The concierge can plan days around children’s interests, including a treasure-style art hunt through the Louvre, a rather more enticing prospect for younger visitors than being marched purposefully towards the Mona Lisa.
The hotel’s positioning couldn’t be better. The Tuileries begin almost outside the door; the Musée de l’Orangerie and Seine are close by, and much of central Paris can be explored on foot. One morning, we strolled 10 minutes into the Tuileries Garden, where our daughter spent hours playing with local children in the playground, followed by rotations on the carousel and a cloud of candyfloss.
Taking the plunge beneath the palace
Deep inside Sense, A Rosewood Spa is one of Paris’s more extraordinary hotel pools.
Huge skylights flood the space with daylight, creating an otherworldly experience in which to swim while, several floors above, the traffic continues around Place de la Concorde.
For children, none of this architectural drama is particularly relevant. However, it is a very good swimming pool.
Paul Pairet, with children
Dinner is often where staying in a grand hotel with children becomes slightly less glamorous. You want to eat somewhere good; they want pasta, preferably before 7pm. At the Crillon, Nonos & Comestibles par Paul Pairet manages to keep everyone happy. The chef’s lively, less formal take on a French dining room feels grown-up enough for dinner, without being remotely stuffy.
Pairet, best known for his three-Michelin-starred Ultraviolet in Shanghai, returned to Paris to create a restaurant built around food you immediately want to order: eggs mimosa, onion soup and cheese soufflé; steaks from the grill, beef tartare and sole meunière; proper fries, potato gratin and mash on the side.
We began with the Eggs Mimosa Mama, topped with tuna and anchovies. It turned out to be the best version of the dish we have eaten. Then came a cheese soufflé of impossible lightness, another contender for a best-ever list. Followed by beef tartare with tiny cubes of crisp French fries and a steak from the grill.
Our daughter happily worked her way through coquillettes with ham and cheese and a side of fries, followed by ice cream. Other options for little ones include ground beef topped with egg and cheese, free-range chicken and grilled salmon with béarnaise. And for those who will accept nothing but the familiar, there are chicken nuggets.
When it came time to order dessert, we said we couldn’t possibly manage another course. Our waiter disagreed.
He brought strawberries with Chantilly cream and strawberry sorbet, alongside Pairet’s tarte à la crème. The tart was spectacularly good.
The people make the palace
For all the theatre of the building, the strongest memory of our stay is the hospitality.
It was, quite simply, the best we have encountered anywhere in the world.
Beginning at the top and running all the way through the hotel: from the Managing Director and concierge to the restaurant teams and porters at the door. There was none of the chilly formality that can make staying in a grand European hotel with children feels as though you’ve broken an unwritten rule.
Instead, everyone seemed genuinely pleased to have us there. Our daughter invariably received more attention than we did, greeted by name and fussed over with the easy warmth usually reserved for the most important guests in the room.
And that is why Le Petit Crillon works. The tipi, Benny the elephant, colouring books and children’s menus are all lovely touches, but what makes the hotel genuinely good for families goes beyond the amenities. You can stay in one of Paris’s great palace hotels without spending the weekend feeling as though you need to apologise for bringing a child with you.
Parents still get the Crillon: the chandeliers, Paul Pairet, L’Écrin, cocktails at Les Ambassadeurs, a spectacular pool and eggs timed to the minute. Children get their own version of luxury: a bedroom den, Louvre treasure hunts, sweets, hot chocolate and a television beside the bath.
The flaky croissants, thankfully, are for everyone.
Hôtel de Crillon, A Rosewood Hotel, 10 Pl. de la Concorde, 75008 Paris, France, (+33) 1 44 71 15 00
