When you first walk into Cyril Mariaux’s courtyard enclave, you’ll want to get in touch with your own creative side, ideally while enjoying a cup of café au lait.

It’s doubtful whether we’d achieve the same results, but if not, the ambience certainly wouldn’t be to blame. The space is flooded with sunlight, complete with thoughtful details and sketches on the walls. But it’s not at all pretentious.

Everything here seems to have just ended up where it is by sheer coincidence. A bit like how Cyril ended up in Munich; the artist, who was born in Toulon in 1971, came here in 2005 after having studied in Paris and worked there as an illustrator.

And just one ‘téléphone’ later, as the Frenchman says – voilà – his 3D collages are decorating the walls of our new hotel in Munich. ‘I just do illustrations,’ he explains modestly. And his favourite method is to combine paper clippings with drawings.

His collages at the hotel bring the neighbourhood to life. For the works, he selected seven of his favourite locations that he finds particularly inspiring. Like the Müller’sches Volksbad, for example, which was once the largest swimming pool in the world, or Wiener Platz with its little stands that remind him of French vegetable and fish markets...

…Bordeauxplatz: despite its name, it turns out that, misleadingly, only water comes out of the fountain rather than red wine. Or, as you can see here, the old Kriechbaumhof on Preysingstrasse, which is a historic hostel building.

The artist, who loves to create extremely detailed small pieces of art, found working with such a large format for this project a struggle. ‘A good challenge!’ he laughs. And he made it work. He wanted to inspire the guests to wander around Haidhausen and discover the most beautiful spots for themselves. We hope that you’ll do just that!