10 boulevard Maréchal Foch, Côte-d'Or
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Burgundy's tasting cellars keep a spittoon within reach of the barrels. Professionals use it, and they leave the last cellar of the day as clear-headed as they entered the first. Visitors on holiday are rarely so disciplined, and by the third tasting the spittoon has become largely decorative. Beaune is full of such visitors, and Le Cèdre is made for them. It is a winegrower's mansion facing the old ramparts, close enough to the town's cellars to walk home from them.
The house was built in the nineteenth century for a winegrower who had done very well. It still has the solid, comfortable look of new money from old vines. Inside, antiques sit easily among modern pieces, in colours as soft as felt. At the back, a green garden makes it easy to forget that the glazed roof of the Hospices is a short stroll away. The Beauvallon group runs the place now, and it shows mainly in how smoothly things go, with very few surprises either way.
There are forty rooms and suites, each furnished a little differently in the same quiet palette. Some of the larger ones have a mezzanine, which is handy for families travelling with children. Downstairs, the lounge bar has a fireplace and a billiard table. In the evening it is where the day's tastings are discussed, with the kind of confidence that only a day of tasting can bring.
Days are spent in other people's cellars, and the concierge is happy to set up the visits. For the villages of the Côte de Beaune, the hotel hires out electric bikes, best ridden before the tastings rather than after. The finest moment, though, is the walk home and the stairs down to the hotel's own vaults. Under the stone arches, the Nuxe spa keeps its hammam steaming, and the jacuzzi can be booked privately. Steam is no cure, but it makes a fine interval between the last cellar and dinner.
Dinner is at Clos du Cèdre, where Jordan Billan cooks a sharply seasonal version of Burgundy with produce from growers nearby. Charolais beef arrives in a jus sharpened with mustard and tarragon, and the list offers more than a thousand wines. This is the one table in Beaune where nobody expects to see a spittoon. On summer nights, dinner moves out into the garden.
The spa has no pool, and with three treatment rooms it is better for an hour than for a day, so a slot is worth booking early. Breakfast and parking are booked separately, though the car is the last thing anyone needs here, and the restaurant takes two weekdays off. In November, when the Hospices auction their wine, Beaune is packed and rooms go early.
Professionals spit. Le Cèdre is for amateurs, in the old sense of the word: people who love the stuff and would hate to waste a drop of it.
Down the road
The spa's signature treatment takes its cue from the fifteenth-century remedies of the apothecary at the Hôtel-Dieu, the Hospices de Beaune, an eight-minute walk from the hotel.
The lounge bar is called The Library: leather armchairs, low light and a fireplace that is lit in winter. From spring, drinks move out to a terrace beside the fountain. The list runs from wines and Champagnes to spirits and cocktails, the bar is open to non-residents throughout the day, and on Sunday afternoons it serves tea with pastries by Ivona Geiger.
The gastronomic restaurant occupies a winegrower's house built in 1876, with period panelling and parquet floors; on fine days its terrace looks over the shaded grounds. Jordan Billan, born in Lyon into a family of hoteliers, changes the menu with the seasons, and the wine list holds more than a thousand references. Outside guests are welcome, with booking required and a smart dress code.
Of the eight room categories, the Prestige Mezzanine rooms are the ones with two levels: an office corner and a bathroom with bathtub below, and a sitting area with sofa bed on the mezzanine above, each with its own television. The hotel presents them for families, alongside the Family Room, two connecting rooms on the top floor, each with its own bathroom.
The Nuxe spa lies in a vaulted stone cellar. It has three treatment rooms, a hammam, a jacuzzi booked for private use and a tea room, with a small fitness room alongside. The signature treatment draws on the fifteenth-century remedies of the apothecary at the Hôtel-Dieu. Everything works by reservation, and there is no swimming pool.
At a glance
Where
10 boulevard Maréchal Foch, 21200 Beaune, Côte-d'Or, Burgundy; in the town centre, facing the ramparts; on foot: Basilica of Notre-Dame 5 minutes, Burgundy Wine Museum 7, Hôtel-Dieu (Hospices de Beaune) 8, Fallot mustard mill 10, Museum of Fine Arts 12, Cité des Climats 25; Château de Pommard 6 minutes and Château de Meursault 11 minutes by car. Beaune station 1 km, Dijon TGV 45 km; Dole-Jura airport 60 km, Lyon Saint-Exupéry 170 km, Geneva 230 km
Why this one
The Hôtel-Dieu is eight minutes away.
On the Clos du Cèdre list.
A Nuxe spa in the old cellar.
The Edit Notes
Clos du Cèdre serves dinner from Wednesday to Sunday and lunch only at weekends, so on Monday and Tuesday evenings the choice in the house is Table Gourmande, the bistro, which in turn closes on Wednesday and Thursday. Friday to Sunday are the only evenings when both kitchens are open. A short stay built around the gastronomic dinner should start from the restaurant's days: booking is required, the dress code is smart, and outside diners book the same tables.
Families have two real options. The Prestige Mezzanine rooms are duplexes with a sofa bed on the upper level and a second television, which keeps everyone in one room. The Family Room, on the second and top floor, is two connecting rooms, one with a king-size bed and one with twin beds, each with its own bathroom. Cots, high chairs and a children's menu are available on request; Deluxe rooms take up to three people, Comfort rooms up to two adults.
The spa is small: three treatment rooms, one hammam and a single jacuzzi reserved for one party at a time. There is no swimming pool, and every part of it, the jacuzzi and hammam included, works by reservation only. Slots therefore go quickly when the hotel is full, so a treatment or a jacuzzi session is best booked together with the room rather than on arrival, above all for a weekend or the days of the Hospices wine auction.
Beaune station is about a kilometre away and Dijon TGV station 45 km, and the Hôtel-Dieu, the Basilica of Notre-Dame and the wine museum are all within a short walk, so the town works without a car. Drivers should know that the hotel's parking is secure but charged and limited in spaces, with charging points for Porsche electric cars; the hotel advises reserving a place. For the vineyards, the concierge hires out electrically assisted bikes.
The price question
The money buys a quiet town-centre base with its own gastronomic restaurant, a bistro, a bar and a cellar spa, run with the consistency of a hotel group. It does not buy a resort: there is no pool, the spa has three treatment rooms, breakfast and parking are charged separately, and Clos du Cèdre does not serve every evening. The real comparison is a simpler bed in Beaune plus one dinner here.
Book it for two or three nights of cellar visits, with one dinner at Clos du Cèdre fixed first and the spa booked alongside the room. A family that wants a pool and long spa days, or a stay that falls only on the restaurant's closing days, is better placed elsewhere.
Clos Vauban
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Hôtel Sainte-Victoire
Fifteen rooms at Vauvenargues near Aix-en-Provence, facing the Sainte-Victoire mountain, with a south-facing outdoor pool and Franco-Brazilian cooking by chef Mateus Marangoni.
The Extra Edit
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