Rue des Têtes, Haut-Rhin
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Every day, crowds stop in a narrow street in the old centre of Colmar and stare up at a house that is staring back. Its Renaissance façade carries a hundred and six carved heads, grimacing and pulling faces at the passers-by, as they have done since a wealthy merchant named Anton Burger built the house in 1609. It must be one of the most photographed façades in Alsace. Very few of the people photographing it ever go inside.
Old towns like Colmar are a temptation for hoteliers. Behind a picturesque front, it is easy to keep the costume on indoors, with reproduction beams and a forest of imitation antiques, until a night's stay feels like sleeping on a film set. La Maison des Têtes does the opposite. It lets the façade wear the masks, all hundred and six of them, and behind them shows a calm, modern face.
Since 2015 the house has belonged to the chef Éric Girardin and his wife, Marilyn, whose architects treated it as a monument outside and a retreat within. A paved courtyard under climbing vines separates the street from the rooms. Inside, the ceilings curve gently like modern vaults, the walls are white, and the mood is closer to a cloister than a museum, with fragments of the medieval city wall surviving in the lobby. The twenty-one rooms are pale and restful, and the noise of the street stays firmly outside.
Up on the gable stands a cooper with his barrel, carved in 1902 by Auguste Bartholdi, the son of Colmar who also gave New York its Statue of Liberty. Liberty got a torch. The Maison des Têtes got a man who makes barrels, which in Alsace is arguably the more useful gift.
Dinner brings a decision that guests tend to agonise over. On one side is the chef's own restaurant, contemporary and precise, with a cellar of Alsatian wines beneath it. On the other is the old brasserie, the one room that has kept its period dress, all wooden alcoves and stained glass. Those who cannot choose simply book another night. When the weather is warm, both sides spill out into the courtyard, under the vines.
By day, Colmar belongs to the crowds, and never more so than in December, when the Christmas markets arrive. That is when the courtyard comes into its own. Spa seekers will find nothing here but that small square of quiet, and it proves plenty. The wine route begins just outside town, and the house makes a fine base for urban travellers who want old stones outside the window and nothing fussy within.
At night, when the day-trippers have gone, the street falls quiet and the hundred and six masks have nobody left to frown at. Behind them, the house dropped the act long ago. In Colmar, everyone looks at the Maison des Têtes. Only its guests get to see its real face.
Sweet side
The house also runs the Pâtisserie des Têtes, a pastry shop and tea room in the old centre, with creations by Éric Girardin and the pastry chef Alexandre Dumel.
Between the street and the rooms lies an inner courtyard of pink Alsatian sandstone, shaded by climbing green. It serves as the Brasserie Historique's terrace in warm weather, set with woven Varaschin armchairs, minimalist tables and colourful planters. The decoration follows the seasons: gourds and squashes in autumn, the Christmas dressing in winter, when Colmar's markets fill the streets outside.
The Character rooms are the largest category, around 42 m², and take two adults with two children, which makes them the family choice alongside the Duplex. Each has a desk area, and the view is onto either the courtyard or the street. The style matches the rest of the house: pale walls, wood and soft fabrics rather than reproduction antiques.
Éric Girardin's gastronomic dining room is deliberately bare: white walls and linen, light through stained-glass windows, Bocci blown-glass lamps as the only decoration, and an alcove lined with cloth scales. It lays only fourteen settings and serves dinner alone, never lunch. The cooking builds on regional produce: carefully cooked fish, meat from the region, broths and seasonal vegetables.
The Brasserie keeps the house's period interior: carved woodwork, a cast-iron stove and leaded stained-glass windows, set against modern suspended shell lamps. The menu stays Alsatian, with sauerkraut served with eight garnishes and baeckeoffe, alongside fish from sea and river, meat and a warm chocolate mousse soufflé. It serves lunch as well as dinner, and spills into the courtyard in summer.
At a glance
Where
19 Rue des Têtes, 68000 Colmar, Haut-Rhin; in the historic centre, near Place Rapp, the Petite Venise quarter and the Unterlinden Museum; Colmar station about 15 minutes away; Mulhouse 44 km, Basel 64 km, Freiburg 54 km, Strasbourg 78 km
Why this one
Twenty-one rooms behind the carved front.
Fourteen settings at Restaurant Girardin.
Pink sandstone and climbing green.
The Edit Notes
The categories differ more than their names suggest. Comfort rooms, around 28 m², face either the courtyard or Rue des Têtes, where crowds gather by day to look up at the façade, so the side is worth settling at booking. Charme rooms, around 36 m², sit under sloping ceilings. Character rooms, around 42 m², add a desk area and take two adults with two children. The Duplex, 34 m², puts a living room below and the bedroom above, under the roof, looking over Colmar's rooftops.
Restaurant Girardin serves dinner only, from Tuesday to Saturday, with fourteen settings, and closes for its summer holiday from 26 July to 11 August 2026. The Brasserie Historique serves lunch and dinner from Tuesday to Saturday and closes on Sunday and Monday. The Winstub Bartholdi, in the same house, opens from Friday to Tuesday. On a Sunday or Monday night, then, only the winstub cooks downstairs. A short stay should be set around the Girardin table first, with the nights fixed afterwards.
The house stands on a narrow street in the historic centre, so the approach by car needs planning. The hotel has a secured private car park, but places are given only on reservation, at a daily charge, and should be requested with the room. Without one, the public Parking Rapp on Place Rapp is about four minutes on foot, and the Town Hall car park is also nearby. Colmar station is around a quarter of an hour away, a practical alternative to driving in.
The services list contains no spa, pool or fitness room; the calm on offer is the courtyard and the rooms. Guests who want treatments should look a short drive away, for instance at Le Chambard in Kaysersberg. December brings Colmar's Christmas markets and the heaviest crowds of the year to the streets around the house, while the courtyard is dressed for Christmas. A December stay works best on Brasserie and Girardin service days, booked well ahead, with daytime walks kept early.
The price question
The money buys a room inside one of Colmar's best-known façades, in the middle of the old town, with a chef's table, a brasserie and a winstub under the same roof. It does not buy a spa or a quiet street by day, and the restaurants close on different days. The real comparison is a plainer hotel in Colmar plus one dinner at Restaurant Girardin.
Book it for two nights in Colmar built around one dinner at Restaurant Girardin and one at the Brasserie Historique, on nights when both serve, with a Character room or the Duplex for a family. Anyone who needs a spa, or can only come on the gastronomic table's closing days, is better placed elsewhere or on another date.
Le Chambard
Thirty-three rooms, including six suites, in an eighteenth-century house in Kaysersberg, with a 200 m² spa and overflow pool, La Table d'Olivier Nasti and a winstub.
La Cheneaudière
Forty-five rooms, suites and villa suites at 500 metres above Colroy-la-Roche in the Bruche valley, with a 2,500 m² Nature-Spa over three levels and two restaurants by Jean-Paul Acker.
The Extra Edit
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