A former private house in one of the streets laid out off the Champs-Élysées in 1823, turned into a small hotel between the wars. The building is not a listed monument and the City of Paris does not protect it. What makes it worth a page is its documented history, and the few firm points of that history are set out below, separated from what only the hotel itself records.
At a glance
Rue Jean-Goujon belongs to the quarter of private houses that grew up after 1823 around the place François-Ier, between the Champs-Élysées and the Seine. Number 12 was one of those houses: the 1910 street-by-street survey of the Marquis de Rochegude lists it as the hôtel of M. D. de Rougemont. According to the hotel’s own history, the house was built in 1857 for Edmond Petit and became a hotel in 1923, when it was bought by André Terrail, owner of the restaurant La Tour d’Argent. We have not found those two dates in a source independent of the hotel. The building does not appear among the historic monuments of the 8th arrondissement, nor among the buildings protected by the Paris local urban plan.
Key facts
- Where: 12 rue Jean-Goujon, 75008 Paris (Quartier des Champs-Élysées)
- Street: opened in 1823, named after the Renaissance sculptor Jean Goujon
- Documented in 1910: private house (hôtel) of M. D. de Rougemont, in Rochegude’s Promenades dans toutes les rues de Paris, 8th arrondissement volume
- Construction: 1857, for Edmond Petit, according to the hotel; not confirmed independently
- Hotel since: 1923, under André Terrail, according to the hotel and to later press accounts; not confirmed in a contemporary source
- Protection: none. Not a listed historic monument; not a protected building of the Paris PLU
- Current use: hotel, run by the Georges family since 1984 according to the hotel
- Coordinates: 48.866456, 2.308531 · open in Google Maps
History
Rue Jean-Goujon was opened in 1823, the same year as the place François-Ier, on land between the Champs-Élysées and the river that was then being divided into building plots. The street filled with private houses, many of which Rochegude still lists in 1910. A few survive as witnesses of that first development: the City of Paris protects the small brick-and-stone house of 1852 at number 5 as a rare trace of the original subdivision, and the Hôtel Vilgruy, a few doors away between rue Jean-Goujon and rue François-Ier, is a listed monument.
The first independent trace of number 12 that we have been able to read is the 1910 volume of the Marquis de Rochegude, who walked every street of Paris and listed the notable houses. For rue Jean-Goujon he records, among others, the chapel built on the site of the Bazar de la Charité fire at number 23, the house of the writer Pierre Decourcelle at number 14 and, at number 12, the hôtel de M. D. de Rougemont. In other words, by 1910 the building was a private residence of the kind the quarter was known for.
The rest of the story comes from the hotel. Its history page states that Edmond Petit had the house built in 1857 as his private home, and that in 1923 Simon André Terrail, proprietor of La Tour d’Argent, bought it and turned it into a luxury hotel. It adds that in the 1950s, after Terrail sold the George V, the hotel he had founded, antique furniture from there was moved to the San Régis, and it names among the guests of those years the fashion editor Carmel Snow, Lauren Bacall, Gene Kelly and Romy Schneider. A 2023 article in Paris Capitale also dates the hotel’s creation by Terrail to 1923, but it appears to follow the same account rather than an independent record. According to the hotel, the Georges family bought it in 1984 and had it renovated from 1985 under the decorator Pierre-Yves Rochon.
What you see
The photograph shows a tall street front in pale stone under a slate mansard with dormers. It is clearly in two parts. The lower storeys are dressed stone and carry the carved work: tall ground-floor windows under moulded surrounds, an arched entrance on the right filled with wrought-iron scrolls and sheltered by a curved iron-and-glass canopy, the house number 12 beside it, and a long wrought-iron balcony across the first floor resting on carved consoles. Higher up, windows with their own small iron balconies sit on carved shell-shaped brackets under carved heads, a central balcony rests on scrolled consoles, and a cornice with a band of carved frieze runs across the whole front.
Above that cornice the façade is plainer: smooth walls, simple windows with iron balconettes and red awnings, and, at the centre, a projecting bay window two storeys high whose base is lettered “San Regis”. The change of treatment suggests that the house was heightened at some point after it was built, but we have not found a record of when or by whom, so we leave it as an observation from the photograph. The hotel describes the front as neo-classical.
Practical information
- The building is a hotel, the Hôtel San Régis; the interiors are for guests.
- The façade can be seen from the pavement of rue Jean-Goujon. The street is quiet and narrow, and the best view of the upper storeys is from the opposite side.
- The building has no heritage protection; what is described here is its history, not a listed interior.
Getting there
Rue Jean-Goujon runs from the avenue Franklin-D.-Roosevelt to the place de la Reine-Astrid on the avenue Montaigne. The nearest Métro stations are Franklin D. Roosevelt (lines 1 and 9) and Alma – Marceau (line 9), each within a few minutes’ walk; Champs-Élysées – Clemenceau (lines 1 and 13) is a little further, beyond the Grand Palais.
Nearby
- Hôtel Vilgruy, 16 rue Jean-Goujon and 9 rue François-Ier, a few doors away: a private house listed as a historic monument in 1981 (Mérimée PA00088837).
- The Armenian Apostolic church at 15 rue Jean-Goujon, built in 1903 by Albert-Désiré Guilbert, and the chapel of Notre-Dame-de-Consolation at number 23, on the site of the Bazar de la Charité fire of 1897.
- Palais de la Découverte in the Grand Palais, and the Petit Palais, about 200 and 450 metres to the east.
- Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, on the avenue Montaigne, and the Pont Alexandre III, each about a five-minute walk.
Sources
- Félix de Rochegude, Promenades dans toutes les rues de Paris. VIIIe arrondissement, Paris, Hachette, 1910 (Internet Archive), p. 101: rue Jean-Goujon (1823), “N° 12. Hôtel de M. D. de Rougemont”, and the entries for numbers 14 and 23.
- Ville de Paris, PLU – Protections patrimoniales (Paris Data, dataset plub_pvp): no protection for 12 rue Jean-Goujon; protections 08-0490 (no. 5, house of 1852, “rare trace of the former François-Ier subdivision”), 08-0495 (no. 15, Armenian church, 1903) and 08-0500 (no. 39).
- Ministère de la Culture, Mérimée PA00088837 (Hôtel Vilgruy) and PA00088810 (chapel of Notre-Dame-de-Consolation); no. 12 does not appear among the historic monuments of the 8th arrondissement.
- Hôtel San Régis, “History”, official site: the owner’s account of 1857 (Edmond Petit), 1923 (André Terrail), the 1950s, 1984 and the renovation by Pierre-Yves Rochon.
- Paris Capitale, “San Regis” (21 November 2023): creation by Simon André Terrail in 1923; the Georges family since 1984.
- Wikipedia (fr), Rue Jean-Goujon: opening of the street in 1823, its course and length, the neighbouring houses.
- OpenStreetMap / Nominatim: position, returned as 12, Rue Jean-Goujon, Quartier des Champs-Élysées, Paris 8e.
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