THE
HISTORY OF PARISIAN CAFES Brasserie Lipp (1/2)
Lipp
is a piece of French history. It's a mythical address amongst Parisiens
likewise tourists. It tells the story of a Twentieth Century Parisien
when Saint-Germain des Prés was at the centre of the world
in ideas and politics.
Even integrated in a large group, Lipp is still today a symbol of the Parisien
brasserie. The French still go there by way of pilgrimage certain to catch
sight of a minister or a star. How many governments have been made and unmade
at Lipp's.
Lipp wouldn't have the same glorious destiny without the personalities of Marcellin
and Roger Cazes, the owners for 50 years. Imagine that during these years,
people stood waiting at lunch and dinner for the owner could seat them.
Like other of their compatriates
(Wepler or Zeyer), Léonard Lipp couldn't stand to live under
the Kaiser after the French-Prussian war of 1870 and the loss of
the Alsace-Lorraine.
Therefore he emigrated to Paris
and created in 1880 at 151 boulevard Saint-Germain, the brasserie
des Bords du Rhin, named thus by nostalgia of his birthplace.
Sauerkraut and beer on the menu. For 25 years Mr Lipp had time to give a reputation
to his brasserie.
In 1918, when Marcellin Cazes took
over the business, we no longer call it the "Bords du Rhin" but
the "Brasserie Lipp".
More than any other, Marcellin Cazes
represented the destiny of these Aveyron people going to Paris
at the end of the 19th century to escape the horizon blocked with
numerous siblings condemned to live on several acres of Aubrac
soil. He was born in Laguiole in 1888, in a family of eight children.
