The Best Tables to Book During Art Basel Paris
Between exhibitions, openings, and private viewings, there’s another essential part of the calendar: the lunches, cocktails, and dinners where collectors, dealers, and artists meet and compare notes
With 211 galleries descending on the Grand Palais for Art Basel Paris (October 23–25), Paris is gearing up for an extraordinary week of art. Avenue Winston Churchill becomes an open-air sculpture gallery, Robert Indiana’s LOVE Wall brings a splash of color to Place Clemenceau, and three monumental bronzes by Tracey Emin are on display at the Trocadéro. Prune Nourry unveils Visionaries at the Petit Palais, while the fair’s “Oh La La!” program gets a playful makeover courtesy of actress Philippine Leroy-Beaulieu. Elsewhere, Paris Art Week fills museums and galleries with exhibitions, and Design Miami Paris returns to a magnificent 18th-century mansion, where Jean Prouvé’s demountable house is reimagined as a Japanese tea house. But between exhibitions, openings, and private viewings, there’s another essential part of the calendar: the lunches, cocktails, and dinners where collectors, dealers, and artists meet and compare notes. Here’s where the art world is headed:
Le Grand Café
You couldn’t get much closer to the action at Art Basel than Le Grand Café, set beneath the monumental colonnades of the Grand Palais. Opened last year, this grand Parisian brasserie is already a favorite gathering place—and during Art Basel, expect the dining room to be every bit as much of a scene as the fair itself. Designer Joseph Dirand has worked wonders with the soaring proportions, creating a warm, inviting space with terracotta tones, polished wood, marble and wonderfully comfortable curved banquettes; white tablecloths, gleaming silver and old-fashioned serving trolleys add to the sense of occasion. Outside, a magnificent terrace planted by florist Thierry Boutemy overlooks the gardens. Chef Benoît Dargère’s menu celebrates French classics, from artichoke salad with aged Parmesan and salmon à l’oseille to bœuf au poivre and baba au rhum.
UTOPIC
Talk about perfect timing. Just as Art Basel takes over Paris, Anne-Sophie Pic, the world’s most Michelin-starred female chef, has opened her first cocktail bar inside the new Fondation Cartier, steps from the Louvre. Designed by Moinard Bétaille, the intimate 22-seat UTOPIC has a Japanese-inspired aesthetic, with pale stone, light wood and curving banquettes. Here, Pic turns her culinary imagination to liquid gastronomy: try the Sacrilège, an unlikely marriage of Nyons olives and Chartreuse, alongside French finger food such as truffled-ham croque-monsieur with Comté and smoked vanilla. While you’re there, catch Ghanaian artist Ibrahim Mahama’s The Harvest Season, opening October 22. And if you’re still hungry, Anne-Sophie Pic Paris is next door, where dishes inspired by Jackson Pollock and Marcel Duchamp add a dab of avant-garde to the menu.
L’Aventure
A legendary haunt of Parisian nightlife in the 1970s, L’Aventure has been brought back to life by Gilbert and Thierry Costes, just off the Arc de Triomphe. Martin Brudnizki’s theatrical restaurant is a riot of jewel-toned velvets, patterned carpets, dramatic chandeliers and softly glowing lamps. The menu mixes Parisian classics with a few extravagant flourishes, from linguine with morels and beef fillet Rossini-style to spicy lobster pasta and a giant chocolate éclair. Downstairs, a mosaic-lined passage leads to an intimate members’ club, where mythological creatures, flashes of gold, mirrors and digital art set the stage for late-night DJ sets. During Art Basel, L’Aventure launches its artistic programme with an exhibition by street artist CeeT Fouad, known for his colorful Chicano characters.
La Table Ruinart × Cheval Blanc Paris
During Art Basel Paris, collectors and gallerists will rendezvous at Cheval Blanc, housed in the Art Deco wing of the historic Samaritaine overlooking the Seine, where champagne house Ruinart is hosting a series of intimate dinners with three-Michelin-starred chef Arnaud Donckele. Inside Peter Marino’s sumptuous interiors, guests gather around a shared table in a garden-inspired setting evoking the Champagne vineyards, for seven courses paired with seven cuvées, including rare vintages. Donckele—whose sauces are works of art in themselves—has devised a menu to bring out the nuances of each champagne. For those who prefer a shorter encounter, weekend masterclasses offer three Ruinart cuvées accompanied by three signature bites from the chef.
Lapérouse
When the art crowd wants a little intimacy, there’s always Lapérouse. A Left Bank institution since 1766, this legendary restaurant overlooking the Seine has hosted generations of writers, artists, politicians, and discreet lovers. A labyrinth of private salons, refreshed by decorator Laura Gonzalez, offers one surprise after another: a jewel-box room upholstered in pink damask, a crystal chandelier almost grazing the table, and L’Astrolabe, with its vast ceiling map recalling the voyages of the restaurant’s namesake, gilded details and Pierre Frey draperies. Even the antique mirrors have stories to tell, supposedly scratched by courtesans testing their lovers’ diamonds. Today, diners indulge in grand French classics at suitably grand prices: duck and foie gras pâté en croûte, sole meunière or beef Wellington for two.
51 Iéna
Once home to two of the world’s great art collectors, Rodolphe Kann and Calouste Gulbenkian, this magnificent Belle Époque mansion near the Trocadéro has been transformed into one of Paris’s most exclusive private clubs. Conceived by entrepreneur Xavier Niel and his son John, the 1899 hôtel particulier brings together an impressive quartet of designers—Joseph Dirand, Jacques Garcia, Martin Brudnizki and Fabrizio Casiraghi—who have given its historic interiors a contemporary twist. Behind the grand façade are three restaurants overseen by chef Philippe Bélissent, a bar, and a sumptuous smoking room where guests can linger over a game of backgammon. Chic without being stuffy, and strictly for members and their invited guests, 51 Iéna is one of the hottest tickets in town.
Kinugawa Rive Gauche
At the Hôtel SAX, an official Art Basel Paris partner, the real attraction is upstairs. Opened in April 2025, Kinugawa Rive Gauche occupies the hotel’s seventh and eighth floors, where guests can sip cocktails on a spectacular rooftop terrace with a 360-degree panorama of Paris, the Eiffel Tower at dead center. Inside, burnt-orange velvet, floral upholstery, marble tables, and glowing pendant lights surround a striking central bar, giving the dining room a theatrical look. Some clients gravitate to the bar, nibbling on sushi, sipping Kyuri Margaritas, spiked with cucumber, yuzu, and wasabi; others head for the tables for yellowtail carpaccio with green chili and coriander, Kinugawa’s signature miso-marinated black cod, and a miso-caramel sundae for dessert.
Le Gratin
For a break from the buzzy circuit and a taste of haute Parisian comfort food, Le Gratin has atmosphere in spades. A sprawling terrace overlooking Place de Valois, a classic zinc-topped bar, and crisp white tablecloths set the scene for this neo-bistro, where tout Paris comes for jazzed-up traditional fare. In the kitchen, chef Claudio Rotondo gives French comfort food a haute cuisine twist, from his signature lobster gratin, prepared cannelloni-style, to a generously stuffed cordon bleu, recently voted the best in the city by the French television show Très Très Bon. Other classics range from onion soup beneath a puff-pastry crust and a gourmet Croque Monsieur to vegetable pot-au-feu and chocolate mousse served by the spoonful.