La Coupole is the grandest address in this guide. It is less intimate neighborhood bistro and more full-scale Paris production: painted columns, Art Deco geometry, seafood, waiters moving through a room large enough to have its own weather.
The food matters, but the architecture is the tip. Go when the room is alive, order from the brasserie canon and look around. McNally has always understood that people remember how a restaurant made them feel long after they forget exactly what they ate. La Coupole demonstrates the point at full volume.
