Maxim’s
The dining room where the Belle Époque saw itself in the mirror — and liked what it saw.
At a glance
Maxim’s is a restaurant at 3 rue Royale, in the 8th arrondissement of Paris near the Madeleine. Founded in 1893 by Maxime Gaillard, a former café waiter, it became the social and culinary centre of Belle Époque Paris. In 1899 it was given the Art Nouveau interior for which it is famous, created for the 1900 Exposition universelle: stained-glass ceilings, murals of nymphs, mahogany panelling and bevelled mirrors. It remains one of the best-known restaurants in the city.
Key facts
- Founded: 1893, by Maxime Gaillard
- Art Nouveau interior: 1899, for the 1900 Exposition universelle
- Designer: Louis Marnez (1899)
- Murals: Léon Sonnier
- Address: 3 rue Royale, 8th arrondissement
- Owner from 1932: the Vaudable family, for over half a century
History
The premises at 3 rue Royale had been an ice-cream parlour and then a coachmen’s bistro before Maxime Gaillard opened his café there in 1893. It quickly drew the fashionable crowd of the Belle Époque, and on Gaillard’s death it passed to the maître d’hôtel Eugène Cornuché.
It was Cornuché who made Maxim’s a legend. For the 1900 Exposition universelle he called in the designer Louis Marnez and fashionable decorative artists to remodel the rooms in Art Nouveau, with marouflaged murals by Léon Sonnier, mahogany, bronze and copper foliage and a celebrated glass ceiling. He installed a piano and filled the room with beautiful guests.
So famous was it that the third act of Lehár’s 1905 operetta The Merry Widow was set there. In 1932 Octave Vaudable bought the restaurant, beginning the Vaudable family’s long stewardship; later it passed to the couturier Pierre Cardin.
What you see
The ground-floor dining room is the prize: warm mahogany walls, sinuous brass and copper, and large bevelled mirrors that multiply the room and its diners. Overhead, a stained-glass ceiling and painted nymphs complete the Art Nouveau envelope.
It is a total interior of the Belle Époque, designed so that the guests became part of the decoration — the reason the room has been copied, filmed and remembered for more than a century.
Practical information
- Maxim’s is a working restaurant; the dining room is seen by diners and on occasional tours.
- An Art Nouveau collection (the 1900 museum) has occupied the upper floors.
- Reservations are required to dine.
- Time needed: a meal, or a short visit on a tour.
Getting there
Maxim’s is on the rue Royale between the Madeleine and the Place de la Concorde, served by the Concorde and Madeleine metro stations.
Nearby
- The Madeleine church and the Place de la Concorde.
- The rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré and its boutiques.
- The Tuileries gardens and the Opéra Garnier.
Sources
- Wikipedia (EN/FR), “Maxim’s”.
- City of Paris heritage information.
- Maxim’s institutional history.
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