CNBC Business | SOFITEL LE FAUBOURG

SOFITEL LE FAUBOURG

PARIS

Location In the heart of the ever-fashionable Saint-Honoré quarter, 500m from the Champs-Elysées and 1.5km from La Bourse, this comfortable hotel is perfectly situated for business trips topped and tailed with gratuitous sightseeing and some sod-the-budget shopping. For the unladen or the déclassé, the nearest metro is at Place de la Concorde, about 100m away.

Style Not quite as chic as it would like to be, but far more welcoming than many in its class, Le Faubourg has a relaxed feel, enhanced by its colourful, inviting and multifunctional public rooms. Classic bistro fare is light and flavoursome in the Café Faubourg, which benefits hugely from its small courtyard. Breakfast is served here too and also in Bar30, which doubles as a good pre-dinner or nightcap spot. The ‘Library’ is another pleasant venue for a rendezvous, formal or otherwise. There is a serviceable gym and selection of beauty treatments.

Guestrooms The 147 rooms, including 22 new suites, are all bold colours and classic with a modernish twist, with decent beds and flat-screen TVs. All have marble bathrooms and Hermès toiletries; some have small terraces. The new suites designed by Didier Gomez are all gold and grey and feature a melange of textures, fabrics and shapes, and a fusion of traditional French décor and pop art. The burnished price tag also gets you an espresso machine, a Bose system with iPod dock and free minibar. The most successful part of these makeovers is the bathrooms, which have huge, loft-like, wrought-iron and glass doors, great lighting, glass showers with dinner-plate showerheads and marble-encased tubs.

Can I work here? It is always a disappointment to be charged for internet access in your room and here you have to pay an outside provider via credit card or pre-buy a card from reception. Unlike some other Sofitels, you have to pay to use the internet in the broom cupboardsized business centre off the lobby. Technical assistance, like the room service in general, is slow. In-room desks are so-so. There are two, okayish, small meeting rooms.