Share to Facebook Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin The terrace of the abbey's lakeside Les Chasses restaurant and the reception desk. Auriane Sanchez / Sadik Sans Voltaire / Abbaye de Vaux de Cernay Drive an hour outside Paris and you'll come upon a smattering of stylish stays like eco-lodges folded into bushy forests and chateaux and farmhouses that were revitalized as hotels on the tail end of the pandemic. One such place is the Abbaye des Vaux de Cernay southwest of Paris.
Following an extensive makeover that lasted the good part of four years, the abbey-hotel reemerged as a polished getaway for well heeled urbanites seeking respite just outside the city. A dazzling gray stone manor set on 185 acres of grounds on the fringes of the Rambouillet forest, the Abbaye des Vaux de Cernay looks like something right out of an English historical drama. The structure is tethered to the crumbling honey-hued walls of the original 12th century Cistercian abbey that once stood here, which was the residence of a community of monks until the French Revolution.
It was later saved from falling into complete disrepair in 19th century and remodeled as the countryside residence of painter and socialite Baroness Charlotte de Rothschild, of the well-known banking family. Her grandson Baron Henri de Rothschild later inherited the property, further updating it. In 1988, the Abbaye des Vaux de Cernay was turned into a three-star hotel as part of the portfolio of a small family-owned hotel group.
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