Interview by Serge Barret.
Stéphanie de Ricou : It was a ghostly place, half asleep, that gave the impression of being in the film Beauty and the Beast. It was in Ghanerao, between Jodhpur and Udaipur, in a maharajah's palace with a sumptuous mirror cabinet kept in its 18th century state.e. All of which - adding to the atmosphere - was occupied by cooing turtle-doves. This is without doubt one of the trips that has had the greatest impact on me. It would depress me to be in a chain hotel, the same in Delhi as in New York. For me, luxury is poetry and authenticity. I also remember, in a completely different genre, a trip to Athens, with climbs up to the Acropolis at night. And Rome, of course.
Cyril de Ricou (FR) Me too, my most memorable trip was to India. You pass through villages that are barely electrified, and stay in decrepit palaces. Buildings like the Pera Palace in Istanbul, before it was rebuilt. In all cases, our first criterion of choice is proximity. Our hotel has to be as close as possible to our site.
Stéphanie de R : Yes, but out of control! That's better. I like dirty, noisy cities. I like Naples, Istanbul or Jaipur. I don't, for example, have a passion for the residential areas of London. Our travels are almost sociological.
Cyril de R We've always travelled like this, and we started working abroad when we were very young. One of the first was at the French Embassy in Vienna. I was 24 and Stéphanie just 20. It was one of our first professional trips.
Stéphanie de R : We were working on the skyline of a music salon at the time. Then we went to Prague, the old part of the city, for a rather baroque setting this time. We're not always together, but we're together quite often. We go back and forth between the building sites and our studio in Courbevoie. We only stay on site for a fortnight. We define the protocols and then leave the team to work on the long term. We go back and forth.
Cyril de R : For example, we've just done back-to-back jobs on two sites in New York, and my last stay only lasted 28 hours.
Stéphanie de R : And the site in Los Angeles! Gosh, that was extraordinary. We stayed in the old pool house at the back of one of the huge Beverly Hills estates. It's really nice to live in Los Angeles at the end of a garden from the 1920s, with stone benches and statues, and to be alone. Because most of the time we're alone in the properties we work on. It was magical. That, and getting to know Los Angeles, with all its people and their way of life.
Cyril de R We wander around at night to discover a bit more of the city. As for the rest, we meet people who work, craftsmen, we go into shops that aren't for tourists, we do our shopping. In short, it's real life and we love it.
Stéphanie de R : That's another reason why I love trains. It's timeless. The same goes for boats, ferries and planes. We've had some improbable experiences, travelling in our clients' private jets. Champagne, foie gras, Le Bourget a quarter of an hour from home and a limousine on the tarmac... You get used to private jets. But then, for the return journey, it's downright grandeur and decadence, as we generally return in economy class to avoid putting a strain on the budget. Frankly, I think it's a great lesson in humility.
THEIR KEY DATES
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