It's easy to feel lonely or priced out of the fun in a big city, but Ben Humphrey has created an affordable bar in Paris where everyone is welcome. It’s a dream come true for him…
It’s February 2023, and a longtime owner of a Scottish pub in the Marais in Paris, who I know from a previous period when I lived in the Bastille, rings me to say he wants to sell.
Despite running a mortgage company in the UK, my wife Sophie and I own a flat in the 11th arrondissement, and I have ©BEN HUMPHREY always wanted to own a bar, so we agree a price and instruct solicitors to proceed.
However, the timing isn’t great as baby Hector is due in August 2023, so it’s all systems go to complete in May. Deadlines slip as we finalise papers, various important parties go on holiday (solicitors included), and then we hit a late but crucial roadblock in that, since Brexit was fully implemented, non-EU nationals are not allowed to wholly own a French company with a licence VI (alcohol). So after discussions with my good friend and neighbour in the Bastille, Pierre Gay, he becomes a shareholder. Pierre is perhaps the only French national I have ever met who not only loves cricket, but knows as much about it as I do. We met watching a test match in another bar in the 11th arrondissement, about 2km from my apartment, only to discover on walking home that we were actually neighbours in the same apartment block.
CHOOSING THE BEER
In the meantime, I had the difficult task of carrying out beer tastings at local breweries in preparation for my new role as pub owner.
On the recommendation of a good friend in eastern Paris, I meet Antoine from a local family-run brewery in the excellently named Noisy-leGrand. Although he’s initially sceptical that we are indeed buying a bar and not just trying to cadge free beer (my French is A-level standard at best, interspersed with Parisian slang), the tastings start to flow once I produce the acte de vente, and we bond over our love of (his) beer and the old white Renault 4 delivery van on the factory drive. I had previously lived in France with an identical car and we share pictures of our travels around the l’Hexagone in our ‘4Ls’.
The Brasserie now supplies us with a fantastic range of delicious beers and IPAs. We tasted a fair few wines as well, and where possible use familyrun and biodynamic vineyards as our main suppliers.
Hector arrives on 27 August, nine days late. Meanwhile, my wife Sophie and I order artwork from eBay and antiques sites to complement the artefacts we’ve already acquired from brocante explorations around the French capital. Back in Paris, manager Ella (Paris born and bred, but in fact of Australian h
