Shangri-La Paris Unveils a Golden Beehive Easter Egg for 2026

Easter chocolate has quietly become one of the most competitive luxury gift categories in Paris, with palace hotels now treating the season as a genuine creative showcase rather than a footnote to the pastry counter. Pastry chef Timothy Lam entered that field this year with the most architecturally deliberate creation of the season: the Imperial Hive, a sculptural beehive cast in 65% Colombian dark chocolate from Nicolas Berger cacao, weighing 1.5 kilograms and priced at €128.

The Bonaparte bee connection is anything but incidental. The Shangri-La Paris occupies the former private mansion of Prince Roland Bonaparte on Avenue d'Iéna in the 16th arrondissement, and Napoleon I's signature bee emblem is woven through the building's historical identity. Lam drew directly from that heraldic vocabulary: the exterior of the hive is decorated with golden chocolate bees, making the piece as much a tribute to imperial lineage as it is a confection.

Inside, the architecture gives way to a layered tasting experience. A honeycomb bar of almond-hazelnut praline sits alongside pollen-infused shortbread shards, a pollen gel with floral notes, and a smooth honey ganache that binds all the components together. The structure rewards patience; this is a piece to be broken into deliberately, not dispatched in an afternoon.

The pickup window opened March 23 and runs through April 19, with reservations taken by phone at 06 61 86 56 86. Collection is at 10 Avenue d'Iéna, Paris 16th, with no online order or delivery mechanism available. That deliberate friction is precisely what makes the gift feel considered rather than convenient. At 1.5 kilograms, it reads as the centerpiece of an Easter table rather than a single-serving indulgence.

For those gifting to a Paris host or client from abroad, the logistics are clean: call the reservation line, arrange pickup under the recipient's name, and follow with a note explaining the Bonaparte bee's significance to the hotel's history. That context transforms what might otherwise be received as an expensive chocolate into something with genuine narrative weight.

Lam's creation is not the only beehive-themed palace-hotel egg in Paris this season. The Mandarin Oriental released La Ruche by pastry chef Julien Dugourd, though that availability window closed April 12. With the Imperial Hive running through April 19, the Shangri-La's version is now the last major palace-hotel beehive egg still collectible in the city. At €128 for a piece anchored in Napoleonic heraldry and Nicolas Berger's Colombian cacao, the price isn't the point; the inseparability of the design concept from the building's own history is.