Serena Williams claims she and children were denied access to Michelin-starred Paris restaurant

‘Always a first’

Serena Williams has called out a Michelin-starred restaurant in Paris after she claimed she and her children were denied access.

In a post shared to X, formerly known as Twitter, the Olympic champion claimed that she and her family weren’t allowed into the rooftop restaurant of The Peninsula, L’Oiseau Blanc. In the post, she noted that this was the first time she’d been denied access with her family beside her.

“Yikes @peninsulaparis,” she wrote. “I’ve been denied access to a rooftop to eat in an empty restaurant of nicer places [sic] but never with my kids. Always a first.”

The Independent has contacted The Peninsula and a representative for Williams for comment.

In the comment section, fans were immediately supportive of the tennis champion, with one user referencing Williams’ nearly $100m net worth: “You can buy the whole damn place.”

Another added: “Who doesn’t make room for a queen?”

“You were denied access because they were serving prejudice,” someone else noted. “Shame on them.”

The X account of the hotel in question defended itself, replying that they were fully booked that night.

“Dear Mrs Williams,” wrote the hotel. “Please accept our deepest apologies for the disappointment you encountered tonight. Unfortunately, our rooftop bar was indeed fully booked and the only unoccupied tables you saw belonged to our gourmet restaurant, L’Oiseau Blanc, which was fully reserved.”

APTOPIX Paris Olympics Opening Ceremony (Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)

In late July, the 23-time Grand Slam winner first arrived in the City of Light ahead of the “unforgettable” Olympic opening ceremony, which the retired tennis champion joined as a torch bearer. Williams joined a long tradition of athletes carrying the torch alongside fellow tennis champion Rafael Nadal as well as nine-time medallist Carl Lewis, French icons Zinedine Zidane, Teddy Riner, Marie-José Pérec and Tony Parker.

Afterward, she joined the Olympic crowds as a spectator rather than a champion after having retired from professional tennis after the 2022 US Open. Throughout her career, Williams has won four gold medals, including one during the women’s singles at the London games in 2012, while the other three were earned in the women’s doubles, in which Williams and her sister, Venus Williams, emerged victorious in Sydney 2000, Beijing 2008 and London 2012.

She was a frequent observer at several tennis matches over the past few weeks, including being in the crowd as Novak Djokovic’s won the gold against Carlos Alcaraz in the men’s singles tournament in a dramatic rematch of their Wimbledon singles final earlier in July. Djokovic won against a 7-6, 7-6 in straight sets to notch his first ever Olympic gold medal, while the women’s singles match was ultimately won by China’s Zheng Qinwen against Croatia’s Donna Vekic.