From a forgotten mirror workshop to an event venue: behind the scenes of the renovation

Every "unique" venue tells a story. Ours begins on rue Léon Cosnard, in the 17th, behind a discreet façade that thousands of passers-by have walked along without ever suspecting what it concealed: a former mirror workshop, its skylight glass roof, its steel framework, and years of dust.

Here is the story behind its transformation. Not the postcard version: the real one, the choices we made and what they change today for the events we host.

What we found when we pushed open the door

A derelict site, in the literal sense. A dark corridor, raw floors, red-brick walls marked by decades of activity, a basement with low vaulted ceilings. And above the main space, the reason we signed: an original skylight glass roof, carried by an intact steel framework.

It is a reflex we recommend to anyone visiting venues: look up. Natural light cannot be added afterwards. Everything else can be renovated; a glass roof like that one is a rare find.

The photos from that period are on our Our story page, before and after. They speak for themselves.

What we chose to preserve

The rule for the works fitted in one sentence: wake the place up, don't erase it.

• The glass roof and the framework, restored and repainted, have remained the backbone of the main space. It is beneath them that plenaries, dinners and cocktails take place today.
• The bricks and the stone, cleaned and left exposed wherever possible.
• The vaulted porch at the entrance, kept as it was. We simply fitted it with an extraction system to turn it into a sheltered smoking area: guests no longer have to step out onto the pavement.
• The vaulted basement, whose constraints (ceiling height, acoustics) became qualities: it was exactly where the noisy activities needed to go.

What we transformed from top to bottom

Behind the preserved setting, almost everything is new. It is the invisible part of the works, and it is the part that makes an event run smoothly:

• Electrics and network, completely redone, sized for event technology: AV control, sound system, video projection, fibre wifi.
• Insulation, with walls lined in rock wool: the thermal and acoustic comfort of a modern building within walls steeped in history.
• Ventilation, with a double-flow ventilation system: the air is renewed continuously, even with 150 people at a cocktail, with no draughts and no overheated room.
• A proper professional kitchen, because we knew from the outset that everything would be cooked on site. It is the choice that still shapes the way we host today.
• The parquet floor, the bar, the timber cladding, fitted in the final weeks, when the place started to look like what it has become.

The basement gamble

A vaulted mirror-workshop basement, dark and low-ceilinged, could have ended up as a storeroom. We turned it into two fully fledged spaces: the Podcast Studio, acoustically treated for recordings and interviews, and the Games Room, home to an F1 simulator, virtual reality and karaoke.

That choice owes a lot to the neighbourhood. Batignolles is residential, and a venue that wants to last respects its neighbours: the noisy activities live underground, La Verrière stays calm. With hindsight, it is probably the decision from the works that has served our clients best.

What this renovation changes for your events

The works could be summed up in three concrete benefits:

1. Light. A seminar day under a skylight glass roof does not tire you the way a day under strip lights does. It is physical, everyone feels it.
2. Character. Bricks, steel framework, classic motorbikes: the setting is half the memory, and no roll-up banner can replace it.
3. The invisible machine. Electrics, acoustics, ventilation, kitchen: everything you don't see in the photos, but which means that at 10:30 pm the room is still pleasant and dinner arrives hot.

The full story, in photos from the first to the last day of the works, is on Our story. And if you would rather judge for yourself, come and visit: the glass roof is more convincing in person than in writing.