The History

Hôtel La Ponche was a small hole-in-the-wall establishment in 1938 run by the parents of Simone Duckstein, soul and memory of the place. From the pontoon, people docked in small boats when La Ponche was no more than a simple fishermen's bar. Then, the stars came naturally in the 1950s. For its raw simplicity and its luminous creativity. They came on the famed Blue Train, which released them sleepily onto the platforms of Saint-Raphael station. They came to Saint-Tropez because it was a “little paradise.” Since then, the hotel has brought together a legendary cast of artists, writers, and filmmakers who have come to enjoy this inexhaustible source of imagination and lightness that is La Ponche. To write. To love. Some even settle down. It is here that the art of living on the Riviera was born. Hôtel La Ponche is to Saint-Tropez what a spring is to a river. Away from the tumult of the current, it shelters an intimate cove, the origins of the energy and soul of the city.