Hotel des Trois Vallees

Hotel des Trois Vallées was the first hotel in the postwar resort of Courchevel, and the look, marrying the exterior of a traditional Alpine inn with a cool modernist interior, epitomized the spirit of the times. Over years of use, though, as trends came and went, the original designers’ vision was lost. Recent renovations, however, have restored the hotel’s retro charm — much of the original furniture, by designers like Charlotte Perriand, Jean Prouvé, and Pierre Paulin, is back on the floor — and today's Hotel des Trois Vallées feels like a vintage film set.

The open-plan lobby is a charmer with its rustic fireplaces, stone walls, rugged wood paneling, and windows framing postcard-like views of the mountains, plus mod sofas and French versions of the Egg chair, a fifties classic. Guest rooms and suites are slightly more subdued, modern and appropriately cozy with blonde wood beds and fluffy white duvets. Some are cabin-like, others more contemporary, with asymmetrical vaulted ceilings; all have flat-screen TVs, private balconies, and fifties-inspired furnishings. At the top end — quite literally, on the top floor of the hotel — La Suite features a living room with a fireplace, two bedrooms, and a large terrace facing the snowy slopes.

After a day on the slopes you’ll likely decamp to the large Jacuzzi, more like the size of a small swimming pool, in the Hotel des Trois Vallées Spa. The lobby opens onto the bar and restaurant, where a large table d’hôte (that’s “communal table,” for non-Francophones), warmed by the nearby fireplace, welcomes breakfast guests. Come for teatime or après-ski, or grab a bottle of Chasselas and a hunk of locally produced cheese from the Épicerie, the hotel’s tiny but smartly stocked gourmet market, and retire to your room before venturing out for dinner.