In Summer, St.-Tropez Sizzles

Here’s a quiz for those who keep an eye on the celebrity scene: Name the place in the South of France where Geri Halliwell (a.k.a. Ginger Spice) went when she left the Spice Girls recently; where Jerry Hall (a.k.a. Mrs. Mick Jagger) just bought a beach house; where supermodel Kate Moss and Liam Gallagher of the rock band Oasis pulled up in a yacht together.

It all happened here in St.-Tropez. The picturesque village-by-the-sea on the French Riviera has been a favorite with celebrities over the years, of course. But in recent years it seemed to have faded quietly from the A-list of fashionable resort destinations. Now the buzz is back, and so are the celebrities.

The publicity surrounding Princess Diana and boyfriend Dodi Fayed, who frolicked here on vacation shortly before they were killed in a Paris car crash last year, no doubt raised St.-Tropez’s profile considerably. This summer, the kinds of people who go to Aspen for New Year’s or St. Bart’s for Christmas (many of them from the New York social whirl) were headed to the French port. Among Europeans, Olivier Picasso, son of the artist, model Carla Bruni and actress Charlotte Rampling were recently spotted. Elton John just went to visit his pal George Michael, who has a home here.

Editors, photographers and fashion forecasters assigned by magazines and designers to look for the latest trends stake out the town. Last year a group of trend-spotters from Target stores saw a lot of cargo pants, and this summer they made sure the racks back in U.S. stores were stocked with them. Tiffany Dubin, fashion director for the auction house Sotheby’s, currently sports a colorful, clunky plastic Emersion watch, a status symbol she found in a boutique. W, the glossy fashion magazine, regularly shows up to chronicle St.-Tropez street life, photographing beautiful young women wearing styles the rest of the world will want to wear next season.

And, like other hot spots--Martha’s Vineyard, the Hamptons, Gstaad, Switzerland--St.-Tropez does have a “season.” It begins on May 16 with a two-day bravade, a procession in which the gilded statue of Torpes, the town’s patron saint, is paraded through the streets. It ends in early October with La Nioulargue, the largest gathering of old sailboats in Europe. But the busiest time is still August, when the entire French nation seems to run to the coast for the traditional monthlong summer hiatus and the traffic and parking can become nightmarish.

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Tucked between the sea and vineyards on a peninsula at the western end of the French Riviera, St.-Tropez is a former fishing port that juts out into the dazzling Mediterranean. One side of its promontory is lined with the big boats and bustling crowds. Around the bend are quieter quais, or wharves, where working fishing boats still pull up at the end of the day with their haul. In the crooked streets that wend between the two waterfronts, the chic boutiques soon give way to neighborhoods where housewives carry straw shopping bags brimming with tomatoes and figs fresh from the central-square market on the Place des Lices.

Crowning the town on a hilltop is the Citadel, a 16th-century fortress that today serves as a naval museum. Farther down the peninsula are St.-Tropez’s world-famous topless beaches.

It was St.-Tropez’s reputation for hedonism that first drew me here 15 years ago; that and the pressing need to take a break from the stifling heat of inland Aix-en-Provence, where I was vacationing during August. Since then, I have visited in various seasons and have discovered that once you turn away from the port and stroll just a few blocks into the old town, St.-Tropez is in many ways still the charming French village that beckoned the artists who first discovered it.

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St.-Tropez first attracted famous names back in 1888, when writer Guy de Maupassant, in the book “Sur l’Eau,” dubbed the town “the daughter of the sea,” a motto that stuck. In 1892, artist Paul Signac passed through town, fell in love and took up residence. His reports of the spectacular, clear, sparkling light drew other artists such as impressionists Raoul Dufy and Pierre Bonnard. In 1904, Signac lent his villa to his pal Henri Matisse. During Matisse’s stay, he painted views of St.-Tropez and sketched Cannebiers beach, which was the subject of his painting “Luxe, Calme et Volupte.”

In the 1920s, Colette came and wrote: “Once arrived here you hope you will never leave.” Among the artists, writers and intelligentsia who lived here were Jean Cocteau, Paul Poiret, Antoine de St.-Exupery and Herbert von Karajan.

But it wasn’t until 1956 that St.-Tropez achieved international notoriety, after Brigitte Bardot arrived (with her bikini) to star in husband Roger Vadim’s film “And God Created Woman.” (She went on to become a St.-Tropez icon and still lives in the area.) Soon movie stars, starlets and the men drawn to them flooded the town’s narrow streets. They pulled into the harbor in their sleek yachts, strolled the Quai Frederic Mistral in their striped boat-neck fisherman jerseys and zoomed by on motor scooters, the women with little gingham head scarves tied under their chins, a style Bardot made fashionable.

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On that first visit 15 years ago, the port was packed with huge, sleek yachts, the kind I imagined only Greek shipping magnates could afford. The seaside promenade was filled with strollers dressed to be noticed, wearing tighter clothing, more jewelry and lots more makeup than I’d ever seen in a beach town.

I sat under the red awning of the famous Senequier cafe--still there--with its advantageous location for people-watching overlooking the harbor on the Quai Jean Jaures. Sipping on a pastis, the ubiquitous licorice-flavored French aperitif, I watched the world go by. The scene was lively, if a little tacky--just what I expected.

Then I walked to the very end of the harbor, past the Tour du Portalet, a 15th-century watchtower. I turned away from the water and headed down the first narrow, cobblestoned alley I came to. The air was suddenly cool from the shade of centuries-old buildings. Lines of laundry were strung up between them. Lace curtains covered windows, and an occasional pot of geraniums sat on a sill. Doors were set in ancient stone arches. On one, a tiny brass whale, curved to fit the palm of the hand, served as a door knocker. I was enchanted.

Last October, while the weather was still warm and the quais still hopping with strollers, I returned with my husband, Steven. Exploring the town, we discovered that the little whale door knocker is still there, ready to announce a friend’s arrival.

Turning a corner, we stumbled upon a cobblestoned square, the Place de l’Ormeau, quiet except for a young artist lugging a huge, empty canvas. Here a tiny shop, the Autour des Oliviers, carries everything imaginable made from local olives (grown mostly in the nearby Var district but labeled as “Provencal”). We stocked up on sweet-smelling olive soap--savon de Marseille--and little jars of tapenade, a flavorful spread of crushed olives to slather on slices of crusty baguettes.

St.-Tropez is a wonderful place to shop, with something to tempt all tastes and budgets, from T-shirts to Christian Lacroix dresses, from dried lavender in Provencal fabric sachets to Prada bags. The more touristy shops and stalls lie along the quais, while the better boutiques are mostly tucked down the narrow side streets. Following the streets as they wind even farther away from the seaside, we passed antique stores with gleaming chestnut armoires and walnut sideboards.

On the Rue Clemenceau, which leads off the port to the Place des Lices, we discovered a few shops selling keepsakes we could carry back home. At the Poterie Augier, my husband bought me a round white ceramic teapot edged in soft yellow and painted with pale blue flowers (about $40). At J.J.K. next door, we eyed richly textured and jewel-toned needlepoint pillows. At the sophisticated flower shop Le Jardin de Marie, we marveled at the deft arrangements of dried lavender and flowers.

Heading into the heart of the old town, we walked around the Place des Lices, sheltered by the plane trees. Drawn by the sharp click of metal balls, we stopped a moment to check the progress of a game of petanque, the variation on bowling played in nearly every shady square in southern French towns. We resisted the urge to grab a table at the Cafe des Arts and spend the remainder of the day sipping pastis and nibbling on olives.

Instead, we headed back to the port, as bustling as ever. As they had when I first visited, the huge white yachts still line the wharves, men and women in black leather pants still zoom by on motor scooters, and the artists still set up their easels and paint the scene. They are all joined by an amusing sight that’s turning up in many tourist spots these days, a “living statue” who was able to keep his entire body, covered with green paint, very, very still.

At L’Artichaut Barigo, one of many snack shops along the quai, we bought a satisfying sandwich to split--a provencale of tomatoes, mozzarella and peppers crammed onto a baguette (about $5)--and found a bench in front of the Annonciade Museum to people-watch. (Although we never got around to visiting, the museum’s collection of Postimpressionist and Fauvist works is considered superb.) The people-watching was entertaining, but what delighted us most were the smooth, blue sea; the clusters of boats, masts piercing the sky; the facades of the yellow and orange buildings lining the harbor; the gentle clank of a church bell in the distance.

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But in St.-Tropez, the beaches are the real stars. A distance from town, most are pebbly--except for one long stretch of sand, Pampelonne Beach--and jammed in summer with impossibly bronzed bodies of all ages. Hardly anyone swims; a more popular diversion is grabbing a chair at a guingette, or open-air cafe, and lingering over a Perrier.

Although there are a handful of public beaches, many sun worshipers fork over about 80 francs per day (about $14) to rent a lounge chair at one of the 40 private “beach clubs” along the shore. The one called Club 55 is known for the most celebrities; Key West draws the young and social; L’Aqua is popular with gays; Tropezina is a locals’ hangout. Le Liberty, a public beach, is for those for whom mere toplessness is not enough: Total nudity is allowed.

In fact, bare skin is so common in St.-Tropez that when Elle Macpherson visited the resort a few years back and paparazzi buzzed her relentlessly in helicopters, she complained that in all of St.-Tropez, “I’m the only one . . . who is completely dressed.”

As many supermodels do, Macpherson stayed in the center of town at the pricey Hotel Byblos, the first hotel to attract the private-plane-and-bodyguard crowd. Since it opened in 1967, Sylvester Stallone, Bruce Willis, Cher, Don Johnson, Joan Collins and Ray Charles have parked themselves in the hotel’s pool by day and its nightclub, Les Caves du Roy, by night.

Another old favorite is La Ponche, a more reasonably priced hotel and restaurant in a quieter waterfront district where fishermen still dry their nets. Though I’ve never stayed here, I once enjoyed a lazy, memorable lunch of freshly caught grilled fish, with a glass (or two) of chilled local rose, on the terrace where Picasso once sipped pastis and stared out to sea. The hotel’s brochure boasts that actress Romy Schneider preferred the Blue Room, with its terrace overlooking the rooftops.

More hotels catering to the well-heeled have opened in recent years, with rooms that cost hundreds of dollars a night.

Since it was our honeymoon, my husband and I splurged at one of them, Bastide de Saint Tropez, a refurbished pink stone farmhouse that is a 20-minute walk from the center of town and has hosted actress Pamela Anderson and model Claudia Schiffer. The inn is set amid gardens fragrant with jasmine, orange blossoms and lavender. Our room, overlooking the pool, had a terrace edged with climbing roses and bougainvillea.

One night, for a special treat, we dined at the Bastide’s restaurant, L’Olivier, one of the best in town (it had one Michelin star during our visit but has since lost it). The tables were covered with Porthault linen and situated in a glass conservatory, the better to appreciate the gorgeous gardens. We dined on regional specialties such as cod with thyme and truffle risotto (a new chef, Christophe Landier, is said to also favor Provencal-style dishes).

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After a couple of days in St.-Tropez, we wanted to continue exploring more of the Co^te d’Azur. So we headed out of town toward Les Issambres, a village that is a half-hour drive (without traffic) up the coast, to a small hotel we had heard good things about, the Villa Saint-Elme. Situated right at the water’s edge, the welcoming peach-colored main house was once a private residence. Edith Piaf and Maurice Chevalier used to visit, attracted as today’s visitors are by the opportunity to enjoy St.- Tropez without being in the thick of it.

But while guests may be able to get away from the St.-Tropez crowds here, there’s one thing they can’t escape: celebrities. Prince Andrew had just departed.

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GUIDEBOOK

Beaches and Nouveaux Riches

Getting there: Nice is the jumping- off point for visiting the French Riviera. Delta has direct service (with a stop in New York), and Air France, French AOM, Lufthansa, KLM, Northwest and British Airways have connecting flights involving a change of planes. Round-trip fares begin at $740 on French AOM and $930 on the other airlines. From Nice, it’s about a 1 1/2-hour drive west to St.-Tropez.

Where to stay: St.-Tropez is long on luxury hotels, but high-season rates listed below tend to drop by 20% after summer. At the renowned Hotel Byblos, in the center of town, a double room starts at about $390; telephone (800) 223-6800 or 011-33-4-9456-6800, fax 011-33-4-9456-6801. At Bastide de Saint Tropez, where we stayed, rates start at about $330 per double in season; tel. (800) 525-4800 or 011-33-4-9497-5816, fax 011-33-4-9497-2171. Residence de la Pinede, a Relais & Chateaux property, fetches $500 per double; tel. (212) 856-0115 or 011-33-4-9455-9100, fax 011-33-4-9497-7364. A slightly less pricey option is La Ponche, on the waterfront, where doubles begin at $170; tel. 011-33-4-9497-0253; fax 011-33-4-9497-7861. Outside St.-Tropez, the quiet Villa Saint-Elme in Les Issambres has doubles for about $290; tel. 011-33-4-9449-5252, fax 011-33-4-9449-6318.

For more information: French Government Tourist Office, 9454 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 715, Beverly Hills, CA 90212-2967; tel. (202) 659-7779 (France On Call hotline), fax (310) 276-2835, Internet https://www.francetourism.com.