Paris with FRIENDS

These burgeoning hospitality titans have more than just hotels they have le Rolodex.

- ADAM RATHE

When Anouk and Louis Solanet opened the Hôtel Rochechouart at the foot of Montmartre in early 2020, it was just before Paris underwent its first lockdown. Some hoteliers might have been nervous, but for the married couple (whose Orso group now counts seven boutique properties all over Paris) it was a chance to indulge in the unexpected.

“We opened the Rochechouart five days before the curfew began,” says Louis, a Paris native whose family has operated hotels for four generations. “But we learned it was possible for the restaurant to stay open after 9 p.m. for guests, so we organized an offer that meant whoever came for dinner could sleep over. It felt like life during Prohibition!”