Beef in the buff? Paris opens first nudist restaurant
Leave your coats, your pants and your inhibitions at the door: a Paris restaurant has begun serving up classic French fare to diners in the nude.
Located down a quiet side street in southwest Paris, O'naturel, billed as the French capital's first nudist restaurant, is the brainchild of 42-year-old twins Mike and Stephane Saada.
Former insurance salesmen, they aren't nudists themselves -- but they spotted a money-making opportunity in a country that enjoys a reputation as a top naturist holiday destination.
"People only get to be nudists in the summer," explained Stephane.
O'naturel is considerably warmer in November than the roughly 460 designated outdoor nudist spots around France, most of them beaches and campsites.
The capital trialled a nudist area in its Bois de Vincennes park in October, while Parisians can swim in the buff several times a week at a public pool.
But Yves Leclerc, the president of the French Naturist Federation, was thrilled at the idea of being able to strip off for dinner.
"We're in the heart of Paris and we're eating naked. It's a little surreal," he said, sitting at one of the restaurant's 20 tables.
"It's like when we're on holiday, but it's even better," he said, lamenting that at home, in Leucate on the southwest coast, "I have to put my clothes on to go to a restaurant."