"The demand for this type of product is significant"

When I decided to do this job, I was about fifteen years old. It was when I visited certain places that really moved me. In our hotel and restaurant sector, we talk about intimacy, which is extremely important.

The hotel industry is also a history, that of the palaces and everything that goes with our professions. I had the opportunity to travel. When I went to the Hôtel de la Montagne in Montreal at the age of 18-20, I realised that there were extraordinary parties on a rooftop with a pool. I also realised in Miami that there were very strong places that were real places of life. From the moment I realised that , I decided to go into this sector.

I have created many different places, for example the first Kaiten Sushi place in 1998, we created with Philippe Stark an organic restaurant but we lacked merchandise at the time. I created the Kong restaurant and I realised that there was a significant lack of choice in the Parisian market. We are the only country where there is a huge border between luxury and the category just below. There are many palaces and just below there was a gap. When you go to Europe and elsewhere in the world, there are dozens of very strong concepts of places to live. For these types of concepts, I realised that the midscale prices were very well positioned in London for example they are over €7-800.

In 2012 and 2013, the City of Paris launched calls for tender to propose concepts. For the Poste du Louvre or the Duo Tower projects, I was in competition with practically all the brands. Everyone wanted these very high quality products with a very strong positioning in the city. I was a novice in the...