"Our welcome was correct as was the service at breakfast and dinner at L’Orangerie. At first it was not personable, friendly or attentive. It was correct. After we met and talked to Pierre, the Assistant General Manager, it became remarkably better. During our stay, the general manager, AnnLore, introduced herself to us at dinner. We like that.
We booked a “royal suite” with 80m² because Houda at reservations said the smaller and less expensive suite would not permit us to have two desks. We stayed ten days and needed our laptops at comfortable tables. As we toured the available suites during our stay, we found some that already had two desks and would have been comfortable and large enough for our stay. For one reason or another, we weren’t able to move so we stayed in Léonor, our royal suite, at over US$1200 a day.
There was a fruit bowl with delicious cherries as a welcome gift and flowers all around the suite. This made Audre happy (and they were refreshed during our stay which made her even happier). The suite had been personalized for us by housekeeping and that made us happy. The suite did not look decorated to us; it was furnished with Second Empire stuff collected by Christine Guérard over the years--antiquités et brocante. Dimitri didn’t like it; he thought the décor of our room was down-market. The main building that we were in was “romantic XIX French country house style” furnished as Christine wanted it to be.
Our entry room was large enough for Audre’s desk and a sofa. With the TV, we made that area for our after-dinner coffee and TV-viewing room. It did not feel air conditioned. A fan was brought for Audre but during the day, it was very hot.
The bedroom was very large, actually too large for the air conditioning unit to cool that room, let alone the entire suite. One night at 1:00, it was 26.5°C/80°F. It was plenty large enough for us to do our stretching in there. Dimitri’s desk was in that room too.
Instead of a closet, there was a room with a hanging rack and a large chest of drawers. There was space there and furniture on which to open all of our suitcases. There was a closet with an air conditioning vent inside (who thought that was a good idea?) In the closet with the air conditioning vent, was the mini fridg and the Nespresso machine. Of course we had to keep the closet doors open all of the time to allow the anemic air conditioning to escape.
In addition we had a very large bathroom with a very large shower and a very large toilet room. We had two sinks and that made us happy. The unhappy thing was that the faucets in the sinks splashed all over the surrounding counter. Each time we used the sinks we had to “swab the decks”. The air conditioning (such as it was) did not reach the bathroom. There was a large window in the bathroom which we could open in the morning and night (during the day the sun was too hot and opening it was like opening an oven door). But with no screens, mosquitos, flies, and wasps entered.
Actually, each room had large windows overlooking our very large terrace. Our terrace got sun until 3 or 4 in the afternoon. The terrace had a table and chairs, 2 chaise lounges with an umbrella and 2 easy chairs.
In our opinion our suite desperately needed a major renovation, beginning with the air conditioning and the light switches. The noise when there were people above us was really awful-not just walking noise, thumping; that needs attention during a renovation. It was a process to turn on the lights: hold the button for the proper amount of time until the chandelier was at its brightest—but not too long or the light would go off and we’d have to start again. The only thing that worked really well in our suite was the wi fi and the shower.
We stayed during our third canicule of the summer and it was 95° and burning hot in the sun. Sometimes there was a welcome breeze. Even so, we at our leftovers for lunch on our terrace under an umbrella.
Our leftovers came from our cuisine minceur dinners at the L’Orangerie (3 courses for 65€ each), the 1 Michelin stared restaurant on the property. Michel and Christine Guérard developed Eugenie-les-Bains into le premier village minceur en France with his “Grande Cuisine Minceur®,” along with a 3-Michelin-star restaurant, and a destination for thermal spa therapies. We ate le Grande Cuisine Minceur for about a week. The food was superb—the tastes distinct and pleasing. Although the portions were not large, they were too big for Audre—hence the leftovers.
Michel Guérard achieved 3 Michelin stars for his eponymous gastronomic restaurant on the property in 1977. The restaurant maintained those 3 stars continuously ever since, even after Guérard’s death in 2024. Hugo Souchet has kept those 3 stars and we had dinner there once and for about 400€. We were under-whelmed.
We had very good dinners at La Ferme des Grives, another restaurant on the property. The food was hardy and delicious (and we had lots of leftovers from the two menus we ordered).
The food at breakfast was very good but the space at L’Orangerie got very crowded and there were not enough tables for all of the guests. Dimitri said more than once, the hotel should only sell the number of rooms which would allow all guests to have breakfast comfortably in the restaurant—not eating in the lounge at a low table. They need more staff and more actual tables and they really need ceiling fans, even with the air conditioning.
We used the hotel’s electric bikes in the heat. We didn’t find paths with enough shade nearby; we rode on roads that didn’t have too much traffic, fortunately. We hiked near the property and also at Lac du Brousseau near Aire sur l’Armor. The fitness room at the hotel was tiny with very few pieces of equipment and no air conditioning. We didn’t use it.
The pool got very crowded with not enough chaise lounges for all of the guests who wanted to them. Again we said, stop selling rooms when the hotel does not have the facilities to accommodate them.
We did like the Nordic tub on the lawn. The temperature of the water was around 37° and it was very pleasant socializing with other guests. The hotel should do something about the mosquitos; they were really bad.
The Chaîne Thermale du Soleil on property, inherited by Christine Guérard from her father, was a totally separate operation. To use it, one had to buy an expensive service (that we surmised French people could use at a low cost with their insurance). The so-called medical services included a large pool with therapeutic thermal waters. Somehow Audre cajoled a supervisor to allow Dimitri and me to test it out for 10 minutes for free. We walked the circular pool with a strong current, got out and shrugged. The spa at Les Prés d’Eugénie was a separate Sisley operation too, with nothing complimentary for hotel guests—not even the hammam. Again, somehow Audre got permission for us to use one of the thermal baths for 10 minutes. We did and in our opinion, it was not worth paying for. The Nordic tub for free with other guests to socialize with was what we liked.
It annoyed us that guests of the hotel could not use any of the thermal pools for which Les Prés was famous complimentarily as a part of their stay. Also, most 5-star hotels have complimentary yoga, stretching or something for their guests. Since all of that was available at the Chaîne Thermale du Soleil next door, the hotel should have had complimentary arrangements for guests to participate. It occurred to us that Les Pres only included the complimentary amenities that it need to achieve 5-star status. Everything else was an extra charge. We did one treatment (soin) at the spa: the Bain de Kaolin en Apeanteru (60€ for 15 minutes). It was sufficiently unique to interest us and it was fun.
With all of our caveats, we recommend L’Orangerie and La Ferme des Grives but not the hotel. The hotel prices are too high and the comfort level is too low."
A Tripadvisor traveler review
Jul 22, 2026
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