Hotel De La Trémoille by Jamie Dunford Wood

This ex-Forte hotel has recently had a complete makeover – mostly inside rather than out – so the architects have had the luxury of being able to design rooms fit for the modern traveller rather than fit around what was there before. The result is a triumph of space, harmony and convenience, and in a great position – the hotel is in that area they call the ‘golden triangle’, just south of the Champs-Elysees near the Avenue Montaigne.

The reception area is open and friendly – prints of guests from an earlier incarnation, Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong, adorn the walls, and the check-in desk of glass mixes well with more traditional townhouse décor, with black and red leather armchairs and some well chosen oils and prints. Staff are in buttoned-up black, to match the new tone of the place, but they are relentlessly friendly – with 43% American clientele, even post Sept 11th, they have to be.

Upstairs, 93 rooms have been created from what were formerly more than 100. The standard category are a good size – 28-32 sq.metres – the largest and best of them with two windows and a sitting area, matching what other hotels sell as junior suites. Even the smallest room, 511 has a high ceiling and a split level to increase the feeling of space. Décor can be described as modern classic – modern but rich and not minimalist, a mix of traditional features, the cornicing for example, fabric walls, colourful bed spreads and designer lighting. Thick fabric curtains and squishy carpet add to the feel-good comfort. All rooms come with power showers, (9 of the 14 deluxes as well as the junior suites have separate stand-alone showers) and stuffed with Molton Brown product.

They have also made a clever pitch for the single business woman – an innovative feature is the delivery hatch, so when you order breakfast in your nightie and curlers, or dripping from the shower, you need not run the awkward gauntlet of having to wait for that interminable minute as the waiter comes in, eyes you up, deposits the tray with a smirk, eyes you up some more, and hovers for a tip. No, shove it in the hatch my man, and now bugger off. The hatch doubles for shoe shine – no one need nick your Lobbs – and early morning paper delivery.

Having started from scratch the hotel has all mod-cons like free high speed internet access in all the rooms – a first in Paris when it opened – and large screen TVs. Yes, the hotel is geared to business, but if you can do without the trendies and don’t need to be on the left bank, infinitely superior to the Montalembert. The staff, too, and highly trained – when the hotel was closed for 18 months for refurbishment they were all kept on the payroll, and they all came back afterwards, with 15 years being the average length of service. Downstairs Conran’s Senso restaurant is popular with Parisians from all over the city.