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Article: On the Edge of Paris, Hotelier Aims for an Urban Club Med
- Article from:
- The Washington Post
- Article date:
- June 7, 2009
- Author:
CopyrightThis material is published under license from the Washington Post. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Washington Post. (Hide copyright information)
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It was a wet November morning about seven years ago when Cyril
Aouizerate took Serge Trigano to a dilapidated parking garage in
Paris's 20th arrondissement. It was there, under a carpet of rain,
that Aouizerate explained his vision of how a boutique hotel could
revive a neighborhood whose only tourists were those paying respects
to rock legend Jim Morrison at the nearby Pere Lachaise cemetery.
"The time was ripe to rediscover our home town," says Aouizerate.
"And what better place to open a hotel than in one of the city's
most neglected quarters?"
Little, if anything, about the place appealed to Trigano. For
starters, the area had none of the idiosyncratic Parisian charms
tourists cherish. ...