What to do in Toulouse?
SelectionTo visit a big city without getting lost or falling into tourist traps, the editorial staff of Le Monde offers you its twenty key addresses. After Rennes, Lille or Paris, here is the tour of the capital of Occitania.
A wonderful surprise that this new Maison Soclo, very discreetly installed in rue Valade, a stone’s throw from the Garonne. From the outside, nothing suggests this almost country house in the center of Toulouse! Once through the lounges and the bar, the rear facade opens onto a marvelous garden where a colossal cedar reigns. Where a religious congregation lived until recently, a petanque court precedes a swimming pool, a promise of saving freshness during the hot Toulouse summer. The rooms, all different, give for the prettiest of them on the said garden. Place Saint-Pierre – nicknamed “thirst square” and so popular with students until late at night – and the Jacobins are a stone’s throw away. No false note, at Soclo.
It advances on the point like the prow of a boat towards the Place du Capitole but remains a little behind. At 8 rue Romiguières, the Grand Balcon building is devilishly Toulouse-style: red bricks, round arches in the openings and this large, continuous balcony on the second floor, which gives it its name. Room 32, surprise, time has stood still: the iron bed, the screen, the bidet and even the wide wooden slats floor have not changed since Antoine de Saint-Exupéry stayed between these walls, in 1926. By preserving this setting throughout the renovations of the rest of the hotel, Le Grand Balcon is the work of a living museum. A tribute to the Toulouse tradition of airmen who, since the pionneers like Latécoère or Mermoz to the Airbus test pilots, have made the Pink City the French capital of aviation.
In what must now be called the “Mama” tradition, the Toulouse address of this brand of city center hotels that are both young and affordable has a great history. Because it is on the site of a former cinema on boulevard Lazare-Carnot, closed for years, opposite the Théâtre de la Cité, that the Mama Shelter has revived. Vast effervescent dining room from breakfast to Sunday brunches, cinema room in the basement in a nod to the past and rooftop for summer evenings, this Mama keeps its promise of a hive full of energy. The rooms, all oriented towards the interior courtyards, are faithful to the simple but efficient standard of the brand. Above all, the very low prices allow you to settle within a ten-minute walk of the Place du Capitole without breaking the bank.
In the Carmes district, a few steps from the Garonne, the Cour des consuls welcomes its guests in the setting of a former 18th century private mansion.and century. The vast rooms, with sometimes spectacular ceiling heights, keep the memory alive despite an otherwise very contemporary decoration. A little confidential – there are only 32 rooms – this 5-star hotel is part of the MGallery collection. The interior courtyard, magnificent in its balance and tranquillity, is a very pleasant meeting place for a drink or dinner. At Le Cénacle, the hotel’s starred table, the market menu at 65 euros is worth much more than a single star. And the food-non-alcoholic drink pairing plays off notes of beets, pomegranate or raspberry wonderfully.
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