This year marks a centennial for Prunier, an icon of Paris, renowned both for its architecture and its seafood-and-caviar focus.
It’s not often you find a restaurant whose decor has barely changed in a hundred years, and whose food focus is the same today as when it began—and yet, that’s what we have here, in its custom-designed home on Avenue Victor Hugo, near the Arc de Triomphe.
I’ve not eaten there, and likely never will: not much of a seafood fan, and the prices are astronomical, but it is certainly one of the most beautiful restaurants I’ve ever seen, inside and out.
The year it opened was also the year of Paris’s Exposition des Arts Décoratifs, which gave its name to the new style the restaurant embodies.
Named for owner Emile Prunier, it was quickly a popular place to be seen and to eat, even through the Depression and World War II, but by 1989 the magic had run out, and for five years the restaurant went dark. It re-opened in 1994, directed by the chef Jean-Claude Vrinat, one of France’s leading chefs.
More recently, it has been owned by Pierre Bergé, co-founder of the YSL fashion house and the kitchen has been under the direction of Yannick Alléno, who earned three Michelin stars at his previous restaurant.
I love Art Deco. Thank you for showcasing this Paris treasure.
In 1974, when living in London, my mother visited me from New Jersey. I suggested a few days in Paris. One of our dinners was at Prunier. Even though she spoke not one French word, she was treated with respect, and our dinner was stupendous.
That must have been an amazing experience!