Recommended Hotels in the 2nd Arrondissement of Paris (the Bourse and Rue Montorgueil)

153 rooms on Rue de la Paix, between Place Vendôme and the Opéra. Breakfast is served at Café Jeanne, a room with a glass ceiling that lets the light in even in January, and the restaurant Pur’ holds a Michelin star. The spa has a sauna, a steam room and a Jacuzzi, but no pool, so it’s good to know that in advance. The standard rooms are about 30 square meters, which is more than reasonable for Paris, but at this price I’d expect a little more.

The 1917 building was once the luxury branch of the La Samaritaine department store, and you can still see it in the lobby, with its wrought-iron elevators and wide staircases. There are 149 rooms, an indoor pool, a spa in the basement and a rooftop where you can watch the Eiffel Tower light up at ten. Some of the rooms are small and the soundproofing against street noise isn’t perfect, so ask for a room facing the inner courtyard. You can walk to the shops, and Galeries Lafayette is eight minutes away.

64 rooms on Rue de Richelieu, a few minutes from the Louvre and the Palais-Royal. The minibar in the room is free and restocked every day, and the lobby has a snack and drinks counter that’s open from two in the afternoon until two in the morning (great if you’re traveling with kids). Breakfast includes cheeses, cold cuts and smoked salmon. Keep in mind that the rooms are a little smaller than usual, and a couple with two suitcases will feel it. The duplex rooms suit families, but their spiral staircases may not be toddler-friendly.

On a side street off Rue Montorgueil (just a minute’s walk from Les Halles) you’ll find a charming hotel with 49 rooms designed by Dorothée Meilichzon. The dining room sits under a glass roof, and breakfast there is a good reason to get up. The Night Flight bar stays open late and draws locals too. The rooms range from 17 square meters (a little small for my taste) to 50 (very spacious), so the difference between the categories is big. If every little noise wakes you up, I recommend asking for a room on a high floor: in the lower rooms facing the street, you can hear the metro at night.

47 rooms on a quiet street in the Sainte-Anne area (Rue Sainte-Anne), one of the most important streets in Paris for Asian food (especially Japanese and Korean). The basement has an indoor pool, a sauna and a hammam for guests, which is rare in this category. The minibar is free too. The rooms have high ceilings and are larger than usual for Paris. The music-themed design is very colorful and won’t suit everyone. I recommend asking for a corner room, since it’s a bit bigger than the others. The rest of the 2nd arrondissement is within walking distance.

69 rooms on the Avenue de l’Opéra, and some of them have a balcony looking straight at the Palais Garnier. The hotel is named after Edward VII (r. 1901–1910), the Prince of Wales who spent more time in Paris than in London, and the walls of the rooms are decorated with lines of poetry that hint at his many Parisian mistresses. The Couture bar has a terrace facing the same view. The downside: the bathrooms are narrow in some of the rooms, and a few of them have only one power outlet. Pack a power strip.

A family hotel run by the same family for three generations, and you can feel it at the front desk. Its trump card is the inner garden: when the weather allows, breakfast is served there, and most of the rooms face it. There’s a sauna and a small gym at no extra charge, and the windows are soundproof. Most of the rooms are small, and the design is functional and nothing more. The big cafés of the Opéra area are a five-minute walk away.

The hotel stands across from the old building of the National Library on Rue de Richelieu, and that’s where the theme comes from: photos of writers on the walls and a mustached Marcel Proust (1871-1922) in the lobby. There are 50 rooms from 16 to 37 square meters, with high ceilings, parquet floors and marble fireplaces. The basement has an 8 by 3.5 meter pool under stone vaults, with a hydromassage bench. Tea and cakes are served free of charge between four and six. The cheapest rooms are really small and their showers are narrow, so in my opinion it’s worth spending a little more on a slightly bigger room. The library’s museum opened to the public in 2022, so this location is worth a lot more than it was a few years ago: the Oval Room is open to everyone for free, and the museum displays about 900 treasures. The famous Galerie Vivienne is a few minutes’ walk away.

It opened in 1846 as a coaching inn on Rue de la Paix and took its name from the Duke of Westminster, who kept a room of his own there (his family’s coat of arms is still above the door). There are 102 rooms, and the breakfast room, known as the little Versailles, has been restored to its 1877 look, with mirrors and chandeliers. In Duke’s Bar, English-style and full of dark wood, a pianist plays live on some evenings. The basic rooms are 18 square meters, and some of the inner rooms look out on air-conditioning units. Ask for a room facing the street that leads to Place Vendôme.

Across from the Opéra-Comique, on a small, quiet square. The hotel is named after Charles-Simon Favart (1710-1792), who ran the Opéra-Comique, and his wife, the actress Justine Favart (1727-1772) (portraits of both hang in the lobby). There are 39 rooms ranging from 15 to 75 square meters. In the basement, under vaulted ceilings, there’s a heated mosaic pool, a sauna and a water massage bed, and you can book the whole area for private use. The lobby has an honesty bar: you pour your own drink and write it down. The cheapest rooms are very small. The Passage des Panoramas is a five-minute walk away.

It opened in 2013 with one theme: French cinema. Each floor is dedicated to a different figure, such as Jean-Paul Belmondo (1933-2021), Claude Lelouch (born 1937) and Ennio Morricone (1928-2020), and the basement has a small screening room you can book. There’s a popcorn machine in the lobby, and the front desk is built like a movie theater box office. The minibar is free, and like the other hotels in the chain, they hand out snacks and drinks in the lobby in the afternoon. The building sits on a busy boulevard, so ask for a room on the inner side. It’s two minutes from the Réaumur-Sébastopol metro station, on lines 3 and 4. A good friend of mine and his wife stayed here and absolutely loved it, so I recommend it wholeheartedly.

Three stars and 50 rooms, some with a kitchenette and a dining corner, which makes it a practical choice for families who don’t want to eat out three times a day. Every room has an espresso machine. Across the street, at number 5, is Harry’s New York Bar, which claims to have invented the Bloody Mary. The design is plain and basic and there’s nothing luxurious here, but the location is great: the Tuileries Garden is eight minutes away, and the Opéra metro station is 200 meters from the door.

32 rooms on a quiet side street behind the Grands Boulevards (the Passage Jouffroy is a few minutes away). The theme is movie stars: black-and-white portraits in every room, and a black-and-white breakfast room with an open fireplace. The buffet includes hot dishes and is open until 10:30 a.m. on weekdays and until 11:30 a.m. on weekends. The rooms in the basic category are really small, and so are the bathrooms. If you’re coming for a week, I recommend spending a little more and booking a Superior room.

An 18th-century building on Rue du Sentier (some of the covered passages are about a seven-minute walk away). The grand building was built for Étienne Rivié, an adviser to Louis XV (r. 1715-1774), and later served as a textile factory. There are 172 rooms, and the category names are refreshingly honest and funny (for example, Shoebox is a 13-square-meter room). The lobby opens onto two courtyards that house the brasserie Rivié, and upstairs there’s a Moroccan-inspired bar. Instead of breakfast, you hang a bag on the door handle at night and get yogurt, juice and a banana in the morning. It’s nice, but don’t expect a lavish buffet. The lobby can get noisy in the evening, so take that into account.

A 3-star hotel about 200 meters from the Palais Garnier and the metro station. There are 46 rooms, and some come with bathrobes and slippers, which you can’t take for granted in this category. Breakfast is served from 7 to 11 a.m., there’s also a quick version if you’re in a hurry, and they’ll even provide gluten-free products if you ask in advance. The bar is open 24 hours. The elevator is small, the stairs are steep and the rooms aren’t big. On weekends the street is fairly noisy, so I recommend asking for a room on the inner side.

It’s right behind the gardens of the Palais-Royal, and that’s the whole story: you walk out the door, cross the garden, and ten minutes later you’re at the Louvre. There are 47 rooms, and breakfast is served in a renovated hall with a glass roof and an orange tree in the middle. It costs €17 per person, and kids up to age 12 eat free. Keep in mind that the rooms are small (most are under 18 square meters) and some face an air shaft, so it’s worth asking for a room with a small balcony. The Galerie Véro-Dodat is five minutes away.

23 rooms on Rue Montmartre, close to the Bourse metro station. It’s one of the cheapest hotels on this page, and the idea is simple: a clean bed, air-conditioning that works and a gym that’s open 24 hours, with no pretensions. Breakfast costs €10.50 per person and comes with homemade jams and croissants. The rooms are clean and air-conditioned.