Hemingway's Paris Cafés: A Moveable Feast and Coffee

The most famous Hemingway café in Paris is La Closerie des Lilas in Montparnasse, but A Moveable Feast also takes readers to a café on the Place Saint-Michel, the Dôme, Brasserie Lipp and the Café des Amateurs on the Place de la Contrescarpe. The memoir covers his Paris years from 1921 to 1926, and in it cafés are where he writes, eats when he can afford it, meets other writers and drinks café au lait on cold mornings.

This guide follows the Hemingway cafe Paris trail through the book itself, explains why cafés mattered so much to his writing life, and gives practical tips for visiting the neighborhoods today.

A Moveable Feast in Brief

A Moveable Feast is Hemingway’s memoir of his early years in Paris with his first wife, Hadley. He wrote it late in life, between 1957 and 1960, working in Cuba, Idaho and Spain, and it was published after his death, in 1964, edited by his widow, Mary Hemingway. In 2009 his grandson Seán Hemingway edited a “restored edition” that rearranged chapters and added unpublished material.

The chapters read like short sketches. Several are named after places or the people he met in them, such as “A Good Café on the Place St.-Michel,” “With Pascin at the Dôme” and “Evan Shipman at the Lilas.” Gertrude Stein, Ezra Pound, F. Scott Fitzgerald and Sylvia Beach of Shakespeare and Company all appear.

Hemingway Cafés in Paris From A Moveable Feast

The café on the Place Saint-Michel

The book opens with a rainy, wintry Paris. Hemingway escapes to “a good café” on the Place Saint-Michel, orders a café au lait, takes out his notebook and pencil, and writes a story while watching the room. Later he eats oysters with dry white wine. The book never gives the café’s name, which leaves fans guessing. It is the purest picture of what a café meant to him: a warm, clean, affordable office.

Café des Amateurs, Place de la Contrescarpe

Not every café gets a love letter. Near his first apartment in the Latin Quarter, Hemingway describes the Café des Amateurs as a sad, crowded place full of heavy drinkers, a café he avoided. It is a useful reminder that Paris café life was not all glamour.

La Closerie des Lilas, Montparnasse

The Lilas, as Hemingway calls it, was the nearest good café when he and Hadley later lived on the rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs. He liked that it was quieter than the big cafés of Montparnasse, where people went to be seen. It is often said that he worked on parts of The Sun Also Rises there, and it is the café most associated with his name.

Le Dôme

The chapter “With Pascin at the Dôme” sets an evening scene at this Montparnasse landmark with the painter Jules Pascin. The Dôme, along with its neighbor La Rotonde, was a magnet for artists and expatriates, exactly the showy crowd Hemingway claimed to dislike, though he clearly spent time there.

Brasserie Lipp, Saint-Germain

In “Hunger Was Good Discipline,” a broke and hungry Hemingway splurges at Lipp on a cold beer, potatoes in oil (pommes à l’huile) and sausage. It is one of the most vivid food passages in the book, and it is all about making a small amount of money stretch.

Why Hemingway Wrote in Cafés

For a young writer with little money and a cold apartment, a café was the practical choice. A coffee bought you a table, warmth and light for hours. Hemingway also used cafés as a discipline: go out, sit down, write until the story was done, then reward yourself.

His approach still works for anyone who writes, studies or works remotely:

• Pick a regular spot. Familiar surroundings mean fewer distractions.
• Bring the minimum. He wrote with notebooks and pencils. Fewer tools, fewer excuses.
• Stop while it is going well. Hemingway advised stopping when you know what happens next, so starting the next day is easy.
• Order something and respect the table. Cafés are businesses; our guide to coffee shop etiquette covers the unwritten rules.

Paris café culture runs deep, long before and after Hemingway. Read about Café Procope, the city’s oldest café, and the Saint-Germain rivals Café de Flore and Les Deux Magots.

Visiting Hemingway’s Paris Today

You can walk much of the book in a day. Start in the Latin Quarter around the Place de la Contrescarpe and rue du Cardinal Lemoine, head down to the Place Saint-Michel, cross to Saint-Germain for Lipp, then continue south to Montparnasse for the Dôme and the Lilas.

1. Check before you go. Opening hours, prices and even ownership change, so look up each place shortly before your visit.
2. Bring the book. Reading a chapter at the place it describes is the whole point.
3. Go early. Mornings are quieter and closer to the mood of the book.
4. Order like a Parisian. A café crème or a simple espresso. Our page on café au lait explains the milky coffee Hemingway ordered.

A Hemingway Café Morning at Home

No plane ticket? Recreate the opening chapter. Brew a strong dark roast, warm some milk, and mix them half and half for a café au lait. Then set a timer for an hour and write, read or plan without your phone. Add a buttery croissant if you have one.

Hemingway Cafe Paris FAQ

What was Hemingway’s favorite café in Paris?

La Closerie des Lilas is the café most associated with him. In A Moveable Feast he calls it the nearest good café to his home on the rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs and contrasts it with the busier Montparnasse cafés.

Which café is in the first chapter of A Moveable Feast?

The first chapter is set in an unnamed café on the Place Saint-Michel. Hemingway orders café au lait and writes a story there, which makes it the book’s most famous café scene.

When did Hemingway live in Paris?

He moved to Paris in late 1921 and lived there for most of the 1920s; the memoir covers 1921 to 1926. He wrote the book decades later, and it was published posthumously in 1964.

Can you still visit these cafés?

Several of the names are well known in Paris, but businesses change over time. Check current details for each one before planning your route.

Bring the Café Home

Hemingway’s Paris was fueled by strong coffee and long hours at a café table. Feel Espresso roasts every order 1–5 days before delivery, so your home café starts fresh. Our French Roast makes a bold café au lait, and our 6 Bean Blend is a rich espresso for writing sessions that run long.