La Closerie des Lilas: Hemingway’s Café in Montparnasse

At the far end of Boulevard du Montparnasse, where the 6th arrondissement opens up toward Montparnasse, sits La Closerie des Lilas: a place that is part café, part restaurant, part brasserie and part piano bar. Unlike the cafés of Saint-Germain-des-Prés, packed tightly among shops and old churches, the Closerie feels more spacious: a wide boulevard, trees, a green terrace, and just a short walk from the bohemian world that shaped Paris in the early twentieth century.

This article is part of a series I wrote about the historic cafés of Paris, and here I focus on the Closerie: its history, what it looks like today, and what you should know before you go.

Name and address

La Closerie des Lilas sits at the end of Boulevard du Montparnasse, near the Luxembourg Gardens and the spot where the 6th arrondissement begins to open onto Montparnasse. Unlike the cafés of Saint-Germain-des-Prés, tucked into a dense neighborhood of shops, galleries and old churches, the feeling here is more spacious: a wide boulevard, trees, traffic, a green facade, and just a short distance from the bohemian world that shaped Paris in the early twentieth century.

The name, which means “the enclosure of lilacs,” gives the place a soft identity of urban nature. The ivy-covered facade is not just decoration; it is part of the place’s character: a Parisian institution that doesn’t rely only on a sidewalk, a window and a table, but also on a sense of half-hidden shelter, as if you’re stepping into a green corner within the city without ever quite leaving it.

History

The roots of La Closerie des Lilas go back to nineteenth-century Montparnasse, when the neighborhood began drawing in artists, poets, students and brilliant outsiders. By the end of the nineteenth century, La Closerie des Lilas was already tied to the names of writers and painters. In the twentieth century, the place took on an even more defined status: no longer just a pleasant café on a grand boulevard, but a central station in the collective memory of Montparnasse.

Character and atmosphere

La Closerie des Lilas doesn’t carry the same urban drama as the cafés clustered around Place Saint-Germain. Its charm comes from a different direction: a mix of dim bar, upscale restaurant, traditional brasserie and a green terrace that feels almost cut off from the busy sidewalk outside. The overall feeling is one of elegance with a bohemian memory: not cold or aristocratic, but a place that can hold a piano, a drink, late-night conversation, falling in love, and real lives that grew into literature.

Famous regulars

La Closerie des Lilas is especially associated with Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961), but poets, painters, writers and other intellectuals passed through both before and after him, moving between France, America and the rest of Europe. Among the figures linked to the place are Paul Verlaine (1844-1896), Émile Zola (1840-1902), Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867), Guillaume Apollinaire (1880-1918), André Breton (1896-1966), Louis Aragon (1897-1982), Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) and André Gide (1869-1951).

Books, memories and stories

The most famous literary reference is in Hemingway’s novel “The Sun Also Rises,” where he portrayed a generation left wounded, wandering and restless after World War I. La Closerie des Lilas appears there as part of the characters’ Parisian geography, not as a monument, but as a natural stop along their route of drinking, conversation and late-night movement.

The café today

Today La Closerie des Lilas operates as something broader than a regular café: it holds a restaurant, a brasserie and a bar. The restaurant is open 12:00-14:30 and 19:00-23:30; the brasserie runs throughout the day, from 12:00 to 00:30; and the bar, with its resident piano, is open from eleven in the morning until past one in the morning. The brasserie suits anyone looking for an easy, accessible experience, while the restaurant offers a more formal and elegant setting, and the bar is known for its piano and cocktails.

How do you get there?

The most convenient station is Vavin on line 4, a short walk from there along Boulevard du Montparnasse. Another option is Port-Royal on the RER B, which works well if you’re coming from the Luxembourg Gardens or the Latin Quarter. From the Luxembourg Gardens it’s a short, pleasant walk, so I recommend combining your visit with a route through the garden’s paths, along Rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs, and down into Montparnasse. If you continue on afterward to La Rotonde or Le Select, you can build a full route around the cafés of Montparnasse.

What should you order?

If you’re coming for the history rather than a full meal, you can choose a drink at the Bar Hemingway or a coffee at the brasserie. For something more substantial, the official menu includes dishes like the “Hemingway” style beef filet with fries, sole meunière, seafood, foie gras, steak tartare, and classic desserts like crêpes suzette, profiteroles, opéra cake and Paris-Brest.

Your choice depends on the purpose of your visit: for the literary significance, go for the bar and a drink; for a traditional Parisian meal, the brasserie; and for a festive evening, the restaurant. Either way, it’s best to experience La Closerie des Lilas not as a photo stop, but as a chapter in the spirit of Montparnasse: green on the outside, intimate on the inside, and carrying layers of poetry, alcohol, exile, art and a Paris that loved turning lives into legend.

FAQ about La Closerie des Lilas

La Closerie des Lilas completes the journey between the legendary cafés of Paris, from the refined salons of Saint-Germain to the bohemian, exile spirit of Montparnasse. For all the other addresses and the full walking route, you can go back to the main article about the historic cafés of Paris.