Figure 2.4. Le Grand Véfour (source: Olivier Etcheverria)
The Café de Chartres sign on the garden side of the facade recalls the first name of the establishment, which was opened in 1784 by the Aubertot lemonade seller, chosen in honor of the Duke of Chartres, who built the Palais-Royal:
“In 1784, the monumental assembly built by Louis, the architect of the Théâtre de Bordeaux, and the Théâtre-Français in Paris, was completed. The Palais-Royal, definitively dethroning the Marais, became the most brilliant magnet of Parisian life and above all the birthplace of French gastronomy.”2
Located in front of the Petits Comédiens theater, Le Grand Véfour is particularly popular with artists and politicians:
“The business of Fontaine [Aubertot’s successor], owner of Café de Chartres, was going well since in 1791, four years after its installation and despite the troubled period, he asked for permission to pitch a tent in the gardens to expand his café and shelter his customers. Driven by the success of the eating lunches with forks, he began to serve delicious dishes ensuring him an honorable place among the young lions of the restaurant industry – Bœuf à la Mode, Méot and the Frères Provençaux – and attract a gourmet clientele that is in addition to that of politicians.”3
Two owners, Charnier and Moynault, succeeded Fontaine. In 1820, Café de Chartres was bought by Jean Véfour. According to Alexandre Balthazar Grimod de la Reynière:
“The former Café de Chartres, after many and varied fortunes, is now one of the busiest restaurants in Paris. Mr. Véfour brought the crowd back. Nowhere is a stir-fry, a Marengo chicken fricassee, a chicken mayonnaise better prepared. The lounges are crowded with diners from 5 p.m. in the evening.”4
Luxury products were served such as black truffles (marengo chicken with truffle at 8 francs) and exotic fruits (including pineapple grown in greenhouses in Sarcelles). The fire in the wooden galleries in 1828 and the closure of the playhouses in 1836 led to a long decline of the Palais-Royal’s fortunes. However:
“Thanks to the talent and know-how of the Hamel brothers, Le Grand Véfour, worthy and imperturbable, resisted this fierce competition and witnessed the decline of the Palais-Royal with complete serenity. In 1840, he was even at his best and definitively triumphed over his only real rivals, Frères Provençaux and Véry. While the great dinners were held at the Rocher de Cancale, dear to the stomach of Grimod de la Reynière, the lunches of the Grand Véfour, ‘very well supported’, were the most popular in Paris. Ten years later, Tavernier, the new owner of the Véfour, even managed to circumvent this nuisance from Véry.”5
In 1944, Louis Vaudable, owner of Maxim’s restaurant on rue Royale, bought the Grand Véfour. The restaurant’s decoration is refined: carved woodwork with Louis XVI style garlands, mirrors and painted canvases fixed under glass inspired by Pompeian neoclassical frescoes – game, fish, flowers and women with flowered baskets – on walls, rosettes, garlands and medallions featuring allegories of women painted in the style of 18th Century Italian ceilings. In 1948, Raymond Oliver, originally from Langon, served a Parisian-influenced Southwestern cuisine there:
“As a promoter of regional cuisine, he was fully committed to the recipes of his Southwest and reviving old recipes that had fallen into oblivion. The fish terrine Guillaume Tirel, also known as Taillevent, Charles V’s master chef and author of the first cooking treatise written in French, the sweetbread with verjus – green grape juice – is similar to foie gras, garlic chicken, lamprey or Prince Rainier III pigeon…”6
Raymond Oliver was awarded athird Michelin star in 1953. The same year, the chef appeared in the first television cooking show Art et magie de la cuisine, which he co-hosted with Catherine Langeais for 13 years. It gave him a worldwide reputation. “The era of the star chef is open: kings, queens, politicians, women of the world, fashion designers, financiers, have all succeeded each other in the golden lounges during the thirty-six years of Raymond Oliver’s reign”. The restaurant’s reputation is also linked to the presence of a clientele from the world of culture (Jean Giraudoux, Sacha Guitry, Louis Aragon, Elsa Triolet, Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, Marcel Pagnol, Jean Genet, André Malraux, etc.), in particular Jean Cocteau (loyal customer who lived at 36, rue de Montpensier) with whom Raymond Oliver wrote a book, Recettes pour un ami, published in 19647. After Jean Taittinger, chef Guy Martin became the owner of the Grand Véfour in 1991.
From this center, restaurants spread geographically and socially.
2.2. … to a logic of axes
Restaurants spread geographically according to a logic of axes, mainly on the right bank of the Seine initially.
2.2.1. Axial diffusion
During the 19th Century, the flow of eaters and, correlatively, the locations of restaurants mainly moved towards the west of Paris [ORT 90]. The Parisian geography of restaurants was modeled on that of urban transformations, in particular the layout of structuring openings (boulevards) and the organization of a traffic network linking the center with the new districts.
Rolande Bonnain explains:
“When prostitution played too much of a role in the activities of the neighborhood [Palais-Royal], the establishments that did not live off it migrated to the Boulevards, where the great cafés and restaurants were frequented and cited by Alexandre Dumas or Balzac could be found: the Grand Hôtel, the Café Anglais, the Café de Paris, the Maison Dorée, the Café Riche. The appearance of the neighborhood was no longer the same: wide avenues where private cars traveled, large establishments where luxury could be seen in the decoration and the number of seats offered by the restaurant. All the Parisian activities were gathered there, divided between money and entertainment: banking, luxury shops, theater, music, dance and the press were crowding boulevard des Italiens and the surrounding area.” [BON 75, p. 120, author’s translation]
The geographical spread of restaurants can be linked to the new socioeconomic and urban dynamics of Paris:
“The restaurateurs, in their travels, followed the phases of Parisian emigration […]. From 1815 to 1830, this greatness was not reduced; but perhaps, as it spread, it was less real, less solid and less sustainable than in the previous era. Thus, the number of restaurateurs increased; these establishments, with admirable intelligence, addressed all needs and all distractions; they were placed at all levels of society, and spread in the existence of each other and in life in general new facilities, of which they had not found anywhere the traces and the indication. This was the true and first merit of the restaurants in Paris during these 15 years.” [BRI 03, p. 93, p. 98, author’s translation]
At the same time, it followed, supported, maintained and reinforced the urban “staging” of the city of Paris.
Thus:
“Under the Empire a new geography
