HOTEL BINDA.
Everybody in Paris knows the Hotel Binda, and it is known by a great many people who have never been in Paris. With New Yorkers the house is a favorite because it is kept by Mr. Charles Binda who for years was manager of Delmonico’s, and this settles at once and satisfactorily the important question of cuisine. The house was opened in 1878. It is solidly built of stone, five stories high, and is an imposing structure. It stands in rue de l’Echelle, on a corner of the avenue de l’Opéra, the principal business street of Paris, and probably the handsomest shopping street in the world. It is most conveniently located for the principal places of interest—the Grand Opera, Palais Royal, the Louvre galleries, etc. One minute’s walk brings you to the rue de Rivoli, that wide open street, one side of which is flanked by the open and beautiful gardens of the Tuileries.
If in the heat of a summer day in walking to Place Vendome or to the Champs Élysées, you wish to avoid sunny rue de Rivoli, shade is at your very door in the narrow but picturesque rue St. Honoré, which, with its little shops, its hotels, old churches, etc., is a feature of outdoor life in Paris.
The Grand Opera is at the other end of the Avenue de l’Opéra, a short walk. But omnibuses pass the door, by which you can reach any part of Paris at the expense of a few sous. And, for that matter, it is only a thirty-cent cab fare to the Grand Opera, to the offices of the American Minister, Whitelaw Reid, in Avenue Hoche, or to the Anglo-American Bank on the corner of Chaussée d’Antin and rue Meyerbeer. Cocher will go fast enough if by the course and slow enough (too slow) if by the hour.
Instead of a courtyard such as many hotels in Paris have, and which in some cases are useless, the space on the ground floor is used by the Binda for a grand, glass-enclosed reception and reading-room, beautifully lighted by day and by night. There is also a grand drawing-room and a smoking-room, which unlike the dingy rooms turned over to the use of men in some English hotels is, in the Binda, a very bright and attractive apartment.
All the apartments are comfortably and tastefully furnished, but some of the rooms are furnished in palatial style. There are baths on every floor and some rooms have running water. Of course there are electric lights and an ascenseur, Anglice “lift.” But for all its grandeur, one may live at the Binda at moderate cost.
If you know about how wide you wish to open your purse in selecting apartments you can tell as precisely as you could in an American hotel how much your bill will amount to for a stay of five days or five weeks. Single rooms may be had from seven to twelve francs per day; double rooms from fourteen to thirty francs. Special rates, lower than these, are made to guests remaining a length of time. Here is the tariff for the dining-room: Plain breakfast (tea or chocolate) 1f. 50c., about 30 cents; table d’hôte dinner, served at separate tables, 6f., servant’s board 6f. per day. No charge is made for attendance.
That Charles Binda is proprietor is guarantee that the table is equal to the Cambridge in New York, or the Albemarle in London, and these satisfy the most fastidious. Mr. Binda is famous for his cuisine, but he prides himself most upon the quality of his guests. He demands that above and beyond everything else his house shall be select, and it is so in the fullest sense. You may meet crowned heads and princes there. Hon. Thomas L. James, one of New York’s honored and honorable citizens, with his charming family, stayed at the Binda while he was in Paris last summer, and I also saw Judge Dittenhoefer, the family of Vice-Consul Hooper, and other well-known Americans in the reading-room. Yes, the Binda is a select family hotel. Address No. 11 rue de l’Echelle.