Like the Zeyer's or the Wepler's,
numerous Alsacian families settled in Paris after the war of
1870 and created brasseries. This was the case with the Zimmer's.
For reasons of the germanophobic climate that
prevailed in the capital after the defeat of the French in Sedan
under Napoleon III, several of the more patriotic French snubbed
the Zimmer's. It was a journalist of the "Courrier Français" who
appeased the fears in 1898 that Mr Zimmer, Alcasian owner had
chosen France and that the "connoisseurs of good beer" could
go to the Zimmer brasserie.
The story of the Zimmer brasserie since 1896 is
intimately linked to that of the Chatelet Theatre. A single door
serarates the brasserie from the hall of the Theatre.
In the last years of the 19th century and at the
beginning of the 20th century, the brasserie with it's four floors
was a grand and luxurious establishment. In addition to the restaurant
staff, the personnel included in the 20's firemen, barmen, cutlerymen,
wine cellarmen....
Sarah Bernhardt, Jules Verne, Richard Strauss
, Gustav Mahler, Arturo Toscanini, Claude Debussy, Emile Zola,
Marcel Proust, Guillaume Apollinaire, Vaslav Nijinski, Serge
de Diaghiliev, Edmond Rostand, Henri de Toulouse Lautrec, Pablo
Picasso, Igor Stravinski, Louis Ferdinand Céline and many
others visited the establishment.
In 2000, the decorator Jacques Garcia redecorated
this place filled with history, making the place du Châtelet
one of the most beautiful cafés in Paris.
"The brasserie now
has two basements but a third had existed before being walled
up. During the second world war the Resistance gathered in
this third basement, a stock of weapons must have been stored
there. Recently a man, Gé, from Israel passing through
Paris, confirmed this story to the owner explaining to him
emotionally that he owed his life to this secret stock of
weapons that not even the Gestapo could find. Unfortunately
he was unable to rediscover the passage. The secret lives
on..." you can read on the website.
Website
edited by the Press society PARIS BISTRO EDITIONS - All rights
reserved - 2008
For reasons of the germanophobic climate that
prevailed in the capital after the defeat of the French in Sedan
under Napoleon III, several of the more patriotic French snubbed
the Zimmer's. It was a journalist of the "Courrier Français" who
appeased the fears in 1898 that Mr Zimmer, Alcasian owner had
chosen France and that the "connoisseurs of good beer" could
go to the Zimmer brasserie.