In Grasse, the countdown is now under way. Ott Heritage Hospitality, the listed property company (OHH – Euronext Access Paris) chaired by Jean-François Ott, used a gathering held on 16 September 2026 with entrepreneurs and business figures from the Grasse area to set out the details of its ultra-luxury hotel project. The stated aim is to revive the former Hôtel Victoria, a Belle Époque showpiece built in the early 20th century that had stood empty for several years.
The group, then known as Courbet Héritage, took over the property at 7 avenue Riou Blanquet in January 2025, as La Tribune de l’Hôtellerie reported at the time of the acquisition. Since then, the company has changed its name to Ott Heritage Hospitality, a rebrand that accompanies a broader expansion into several French cities with strong heritage potential.
A programme now given firm figures
The project involves a €30 million investment. Once complete, the Hôtel Victoria will offer 45 rooms and suites, a 400m² spa and a restaurant with a panoramic terrace. Works are due to start this September, with delivery expected at the start of the 2028 season, between April and May.
The design has been entrusted to architect Mireille Bompard, working alongside Bouygues Construction on the build, together with French-American designer Elliott Barnes. The scheme has also been presented to France’s chief heritage architect (Architecte en Chef des Bâtiments de France), a mandatory step for a building of recognised heritage value. Jean-François Ott has himself described the property as a kind of small Carlton for Grasse, in a Bourse Direct interview on 7 July 2026, with the ambition of preserving the property’s historic character while incorporating contemporary luxury standards.
Grasse: a hotel market out of step with its renown
The choice of Grasse responds to what the group described, from the time of acquisition, as an imbalance between supply and demand. Compared with Nice or Cannes, the town remains under-equipped in the upscale segment: its hotel stock comprises only around twenty properties, of which just one five-star hotel with 16 rooms. Ott said he was convinced there was no true five-star hotel in Grasse, in comments made in the Bourse Direct interview, noting that the town attracts around 2 million visitors a year, against 11 million for nearby Cannes.
The chairman also envisages the future hotel as a hub for the local perfume economy: more than 2,000 perfume launches are held worldwide each year, most of them in Grasse, home to globally known houses alongside groups such as L’Oréal and LVMH. The building is accordingly designed as a venue dedicated to such events, in a sector where, according to Jean-François Ott, 4.5 billion people wear fragrance daily around the world.
An international operator sought, tied to a fragrance brand
On the operating side, discussions were under way at the time of acquisition with several leading hotel operators, including Accor, Hilton, Marriott and IHG, with a view to securing world-class management. Jean-François Ott said at the time of the acquisition announcement that the group’s strategy included finalising a partnership with a prestigious hotel brand alongside a fragrance brand, to ensure management reflecting the group’s values and ambitions.
Jean-François Ott, a method forged in Prague
The Grasse project illustrates a method the chairman has applied for more than thirty years. After starting out in financial markets in the late 1980s, Jean-François Ott founded Orco in the wake of the fall of the Berlin Wall to invest in Central Europe. The group went on to develop more than 250 buildings in Prague and Warsaw, cities where the price per square metre, bought at between €150 and €400 in the early 1990s, now exceeds €15,000 to €20,000.
Ott has said his group’s DNA lies in identifying a market at a turning point, one waiting for its moment, in the Bourse Direct interview. He applied the same approach in Lourdes, one of France’s largest hotel markets, which has drawn 4 million visitors a year for the past 150 years – a figure that can reach 6 million during papal visits – at property prices twenty to thirty times lower than comparable French cities such as Lyon or Grenoble. There, Ott Heritage Hospitality signed with Marriott International for the conversion of the Hôtel Christ Roi into a Four Points Flex by Sheraton.
The group now claims around ten hotels across Lourdes, Cannes and La Bourboule, alongside the Grasse project. In Cannes, the group is expanding its portfolio from around a hundred to roughly 300 rooms across three adjoining properties, positioned in the three- to four-star lifestyle segment rather than ultra-luxury, a segment it considers already locked up by buyers with considerable resources. In La Bourboule, a spa town historically specialising in the treatment of asthma, the group is converting the former head office of Crédit Lyonnais into a hotel, close to the Vulcania theme park.
Development is also continuing around the Nevers-Magny-Cours circuit, where Ott Heritage Hospitality is developing a hotel and racing destination combining an 85-key five-star hotel with a lifestyle offering. Further projects are under study in Provence and around Val d’Isère, while the group is also positioned to take over a public hospital site due to close.
An openly assumed financial structure
Listed on Euronext Access under the code MLCOU, Ott Heritage Hospitality plans to move to Euronext Growth, a continuous-trading market, around October or November 2026, to strengthen the stock’s liquidity. Jean-François Ott, who holds more than 95% of the capital, has floated the prospect of a partial share sale and a capital increase to accompany this transition.
The chairman presents the group’s model as that of an “investors’ club”: acquiring assets it considers undervalued, transforming them, then selling within two to three years of opening, with a stated preference for redistributing dividends to shareholders rather than relying solely on capital gains.
Institutional backing on display
The project has the backing of the mayor of Grasse, Jérôme Viaud, and his teams, as well as the Banque des Territoires, represented by Jean-Philippe Leyrat. The 16 September presentation, held at the invitation of the Maison de Bacon before entrepreneurs and industry figures from the Grasse area, was aimed specifically at consolidating this local support ahead of the works getting under way.
At a glance by The Hospitality Tribune
Ott Heritage Hospitality details ultra-luxury programme for Hôtel Victoria in Grasse €30 million investment for a 45-key luxury hotel, spa and restaurant Belle Époque property acquired in January 2025, formerly under the Courbet Héritage name Reviewed by France’s chief heritage architects ahead of works starting in September Positioned as a showcase for the perfume industry, with over 2,000 global product launches a year Part of a wider ~10-hotel French portfolio spanning Lourdes, Cannes, Magny-Cours and La Bourboule Group plans to move from Euronext Access to Euronext Growth around October-November 2026
