Lodging · 1908–1924
Hôtel de Blois
Address · 50, rue Vavin, 75006 Paris
Metro · Vavin (4)
Today · Fate unknown
The story
The Hôtel de Blois was a modest furnished hotel on rue Vavin, a stone's throw from the crossroads of the same name and the cafés of Montparnasse, in a street that also acquired, in 1912-1914, the stepped building by Henri Sauvage and Charles Sarazin at No. 26. Its owner, M. Bourcier, often let Crowley stay on credit. The address varies between sources: the Aleister Crowley Timeline gives 49 rue Vavin for 1908, then 50 for all subsequent years.
Crowley moved in on 28 April 1908, after leaving Rose Kelly, and spent the summer working there on several texts before setting off on 31 July with Victor Neuburg on a walking tour of Spain. He returned in 1911 (from 30 April to 3 May, then in August) and stayed there on 30 January 1914, during the “Paris Working”. This series of sex-magick operations carried out with Neuburg began on the night of 31 December 1913 with an invocation of Mercury (Thoth) and ended on 12 February 1914 with the twenty-fourth; Jupiter was the other principal deity, and Walter Duranty took part. The published text does not specify where the sessions were held, some of which took place at the homes of friends such as Jane Chéron: the hotel is therefore the likely, though not certain, setting for the whole.
Back from Cefalù, Crowley stayed there from late January to 31 March 1921; there he initiated the writer Mary Butts into the first degree of the O.T.O. on 11 March. In 1924 he lived there from 15 January to 1 May, ill and penniless: on 8 March he pawned everything to send Norman Mudd to London, received Nina Hamnett, and Leah Hirsig joined him there on 29 March. On 1 May both were turned out for unpaid rent and left for 6 rue Jolia.
The sources do not say what became of the Hôtel de Blois. A hotel, the Hôtel Atelier Vavin, exists today at 49 rue Vavin, but no document establishes that it is the same establishment.
To be checked · Street number: 49 in 1908, 50 afterwards, according to the timeline.