Club 55, memory in the present
You’d almost want to imagine yourself back in the sixties, slipping into a time when Brigitte Bardot and the whole cast of the film “Et Dieu créa la femme” found here, between two scenes, a sunny, carefree refuge, suspended outside time.
Anchoring point
There’s something deeply seductive about this idea. A feeling of light, elusive freedom, carried by those years of simple, obvious joy, when everything had yet to be written, with the Mediterranean as a natural backdrop. And already, at the heart of this movement, the Club 55 was an anchor point, a place to which we returned without really knowing why, except because we felt good there.
The de Colmont family is still the guardian of this tradition, with an instinctive loyalty that goes beyond mere transmission. In 2026, Camille took up the torch with discreet elegance, following in the footsteps of her father who passed away at the end of 2025, as if nothing could break the invisible thread that binds generations together. For on this beach bordering the Bay of Pampelonne, all the elements are in place to continue telling the same story.
Fish apples
Blue tablecloths with Provencal motifs catch the light, engraved champagne buckets recount past summers, white plates with marine accents evoke a sea never far away. The wood of the bar, the beach stretching out below, and this open-air room sheltered from view create a decor that blends in with the surrounding nature. And then there’s the kitchen. Or rather, this way of cooking that refuses unnecessary detours.
No forced travel here. Provence expresses itself with a quiet obviousness: peppers with anchoïade, a basket of crudités, vegetables worked without artifice, simply grilled corn, a tomato salad that breathes sunshine. A few classics punctuate the ensemble – tartars, grilled fish – but always with this coherence oriented towards local thinking. And those famous “fish apples”, golden, crunchy and soft, seem to sum up the spirit of the place.
Collective momentum
But perhaps that’s not what’s important. It lies in the continuous movement of the room, in the fluid energy that flows through the tightly packed, vibrant tables, where each service becomes a form of choreography. The wait staff deploy themselves with remarkable precision, striking the perfect balance between rigor and lightness, mastery and naturalness, giving the whole an impression of ease that is almost the stuff of illusion.
Club 55 isn’t just a place you visit. It’s a place you live in, for the time of a lunch, a suspended moment, a nascent memory. A place that reminds us, without ever insisting, that modernity is not always about change, but sometimes about staying true to oneself, evolving with restraint, refining without ever betraying.
The spirit of the generations who shaped the soul of the place and Patrice’s palpable memory still float around, like a persistent, benevolent presence, ensuring that nothing is lost, that everything remains just so. Times change, of course. But some places choose not to give in. And it is precisely in this quiet resistance that Club 55 continues to find its uniqueness.
