InterContinental Champs-Élysées Étoile

An occasion as momentous as a two-year renovation might be worth changing your name for; the InterContinental Paris - Champs-Élysées Etoile, formerly known as the InterContinental Paris Avenue Marceau, is back, and it’s more spectacular than ever. At 55 rooms and suites, it’s substantially smaller than most of the rest of the InterContinental hotels, and thus can combine boutique-hotel intimacy with luxury-hotel grandeur, without contradiction.

The hotel’s facelift comes courtesy of architect Laurent Minatchy and decorator Alexandre Danan, and in their hands the look is a perfectly judged mixture of classic flourishes, modern edge, and timeless Parisian elegance. The accommodations walk a stylistic line that should satisfy the fashion-minded and the strictly-business crowd alike — as long as the latter group can learn to love the Venetian-style ceiling frescoes and the sharp corners of the modernist-inspired furniture.

Its neighborhood, in the 8th, is a luxe one, a comfortable couple of streets away from the Champs-Élysées itself; only a slight bend in the path of the Avenue Marceau prevents a direct view of the Arc de Triomphe. For the full complement of luxury-hotel facilities you’ll need to look elsewhere; for a swanky and stylish vision of boutique-hotel life, interpreted through the InterContinental lens, this is just the place.