The Waitress at Duval

Paris, 
1878-1923 

French impressionist Pierre-Auguste Renoir painted this portrait of a waitress at one of the Établissements Duval, a small chain of low-cost Parisian restaurants. The first location opened in 1854 when a butcher named Pierre Louis Duval started using meat scraps to make broths.1 The Établissements Duval were often called “Bouillons Duval” or “Établissements de Bouillon” in reference to this signature dish. However, the restaurants were best known for their women servers who wore black dresses, half hidden by aprons and snow-white bibs, and caps.2 In 1881, the Baedeker guidebook advised travelers that the servers were “soberly garbed, and not unlike sisters of charity.” Similarly, a journalist at the New York Times noted the “neat, nun-like uniforms” reminded him of what the cooks wore in the kitchen of the House of Commons.3,4 Three menus recall these restaurants that were once an integral part of the Parisian scene.