January 4, 2018

Auberge de l’Ill by Jouin Manku: 2017 Best of Year Winner for Hotel Dining

Even in the rarefied world of haute cuisine, the Hôtel des Berges‘s restaurant is exceptional. This beloved gastronomic institution was opened by Frédéric Haeberlin in 1882 as a modest country inn on the river Ill in Alsace. The cooking was done by his wife and later by their daughter and daughter-in-law. A grandson, Paul Haeberlin, won his first Michelin star in 1952, a second in 1957, and the third in 1967. His son, fourth-generation chef Marc Haeberlin, is now in the kitchen.

Auberge de l’Ill by Jouin Manku in Illhaeusern, France. Photography by Eric Laignel.

Interior Design Hall of Fame member Patrick Jouin and his partner, Sanjit Manku, recently completed their second renovation of the restaurant, celebrating its 50th year of Michelin triple-stardom. Jouin describes the 4,250-square-foot update as “an enchanted moment for diners in communion with nature.” Like overhead reflecting pools, enormous mirror-polished stainless-steel disks ripple on the ceiling. A panoramic mural in marquetry, a typically Alsatian craft, depicts a moonlit riverbank with a heron and storks in flight. On the floor, swaths of wool carpet in cerulean and aquamarine, deepening into a riverbed ocher, “bring the spirit of the river inside,” Manku adds. Finally, a shimmering wall—combining oxidized copper, more than a dozen fabrics, embroidered butterflies, and paper songbirds—adds a flash of fairy-tale fantasy.

Auberge de l’Ill by Jouin Manku in Illhaeusern, France. Photography by Eric Laignel.
Auberge de l’Ill by Jouin Manku in Illhaeusern, France. Photography by Eric Laignel.

Project Team: Tania Cohen; Bruno Pimpanini; Morgane Bertin.

Auberge de l’Ill by Jouin Manku in Illhaeusern, France. Photography by Eric Laignel.

> See more from the December 2017 issue of Interior Design

> See all 2017 Best of Year winners and honorees

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