As the Olympics take over Paris, the hospitality scene is expanding in the city — and beyond — with a handful of new hotel openings worth bookmarking for a visit once the crowds have died down. Le Grand Hôtel Cayré opened in the Seventh Arrondissement earlier this month with 123 rooms, all with handcrafted wooden beds and mustard yellow velvet chairs, some with balconies and views of the Sacre Coeur or Eiffel Tower. In Carry-le-Rouet, a seaside village outside of Marseille, L’Hôtel Bleu’s design follows its name with 44 harbor-view rooms decorated in shades of blue. The property’s restaurant offers three seafood-heavy, Mediterranean-inspired tasting menus, while a private cinema room can be reserved when the weather calls for some indoor time. Further east toward Cannes, in the commune of Mougins, Hôtel Le Mas Candille was recently redesigned by the architect and decorator Hugo Toro, whose hand-painted patterns appear on the curtains and carpets in the 46 rooms. Its Glow House spa has four treatment rooms, each with its own terrace, and a private swimming pool overlooking Provence. In Nice’s old town, Hôtel du Couvent opened last month within a 17th-century convent surrounded by two-and-a-half acres of gardens. The former nuns’ herbal shop has been revived and now offers personalized remedies, some made from herbs grown on the property. There’s also a bathing area with pools of varying temperatures inspired by the nearby Roman baths.
I moved back to the US after 25 years in the UK. People abroad were more polite than Americans, but I never quite fit in there.
12.07.2024 - 19:53 / insider.com / London
I wasn't prepared for how much the US had changed when I moved back. I'd been living in the UK for 25 years, but when the pandemic kicked off in March 2020, I decided it was time to go home.
It wasn't until returning that I realized how British I'd become and that "home" was more difficult to define. Now, after having lived almost half my life in each country, I feel equally in love with both, although for very different reasons.
I struggled with the lack of personal space in the UK — some of that stems from the UK's population density being almost eight times that of the US per square mile, per World Bank Open Data.
This translated into tiny homes with common walls even in the countryside and jostling for sidewalk space in the cities. It also seemed to result in a populace adverse to talking to or making eye contact with strangers in order to protect their perceived sanity.
Fresh out of COVID quarantine, I was visiting a friend in a New York City suburb, looking around their giant kitchen with its oversized fridge. I didn't even have to go outside to their huge lawn or the wooded roads surrounding the property to feel my energy expand into what was simply more space per person.
This is also when I spotted an enormous orange pepper on the kitchen counter that looked like a mutant interloper. Was this actually food? Was it a pepper crossed with some kind of alien Godzilla? It was so big that I took a picture. I spent the rest of the day laughing at its size.
Although actually, the pepper was funny/not funny, just like when you first meet someone and what you initially find endearing turns out to be the most annoying thing about them.
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In keeping with the American freewheeling mentality, expansive personal space, and a business mindset that allows for growth and experimentation, the pepper was massive due to the genetic engineering of crops. This is something that until last year was banned outright in the UK, per BBC.
In the UK, the small peppers fit into small houses, and the food was closer to its natural form due to strict food laws. Their relatively closed mindset of "we've always done it this way" actually kept their food closer to the source. However, we'll see how big their peppers get in the years ahead.
The pandemic gave me time to reflect on a lot of things I missed about the UK — the National Health Service, the intelligent level of public discourse, and the newscasters without plastic hair. There was also the quiet dignity of the seemingly closed people who would keep you out of their inner circle until, finally, they let you in in a grounded, loyal way.
In contrast, folks in the US often unravel their whole life story to me while standing in the Target checkout line.
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