Paris’s Historic Lutetia Hotel Becomes New Setting for HBO’s The White Lotus Season 4
HBO’s popular series The White Lotus is filming its fourth season in Paris, shifting its setting from previous locations like Hawaii, Sicily, and Thailand. The new season’s storyline unfolds during the Cannes Film Festival and features scenes shot at the iconic Hotel Lutetia in Paris’s 6th arrondissement, near the famous Le Bon Marché department store. Opened in 1910 by the Boucicaut family, founders of Le Bon Marché, the hotel is renowned for its Art Nouveau and Art Deco architecture and has hosted cultural luminaries such as Pablo Picasso, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Jean-Paul Sartre, Josephine Baker, and more recently, celebrities like Bradley Cooper and Gigi Hadid.
Hotel Lutetia’s history includes a dark chapter during World War II when it was seized by the Nazi military intelligence (Abwehr) and used as their headquarters from 1940 to 1944. After Paris’s liberation, it became a reception center for Holocaust survivors and returning prisoners of war, processing an estimated 17,000 to 20,000 people before returning to its luxury hotel function. In 1955, it was acquired by Pierre Taittinger of the famous champagne family and continued as a cultural and social hub.
In 2010, Israeli businessman Alfred Akirov’s Alrov Group purchased the hotel for about 135 million euros. The hotel closed in 2014 for a comprehensive four-year renovation led by architect Jean-Michel Wilmotte and designer Sybille de Margerie, blending historic preservation with modern luxury. The renovation reduced rooms from 233 to 184, added a 700-square-meter spa and a 17-meter pool, and restored original architectural details and murals. The renovation cost approximately 235 million euros. The hotel reopened in 2018 as a five-star property and in 2025 came under the management of the Mandarin Oriental group, now named Mandarin Oriental Lutetia, while ownership remains with the Akirov family.
The White Lotus’s use of Hotel Lutetia is expected to boost the hotel’s international profile, potentially attracting fans of the series as a tourist destination. The show’s previous seasons have increased interest in their real-life hotel settings despite the fictional dramas and deaths portrayed. The new season stars Laura Dern, Ben Kingsley, Vincent Cassel, and Steve Coogan, promising a glamorous yet mysterious narrative set against the backdrop of Paris and the Cannes Film Festival.
