Serena Williams Says a Paris Restaurant Denied Her Family a Table: “Always a First”

The restaurant apologized for the situation, saying that the rooSerena Williams wasn’t happy with her recent experience at a five-star Paris hotel’s restaurant.

On Monday, the tennis champion slammed the Paris Peninsula for an encounter between staff and her family, including her children with husband Alexis Ohanian, six-year-old Alexis Olympia and 11-month-old Adira River.

“Yikes @PeninsulaParis I’ve been denied access to rooftop to eat in a empty restaurant of nicer places but never with my kids,” she wrote on X, captioning a photo of the hotel’s sign. “Always a first. #Olympic2024.”

“Dear Mrs. Williams, Please accept our deepest apologies for the disappointment you encountered tonight,” the post read. “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.”

They added, “We have always been honored to welcome you and will always be to welcome you again.”

The Peninsula shared a similar sentiment in a statement provided to Today.

“In response to Mrs. Williams’ tweet, for whom we have the utmost admiration and respect, as we do for all our esteemed guests; we can only reiterate our deepest apologies for her perception of [Monday’s] situation,” they said. “[On] August 5th, our rooftop bar was indeed unfortunately fully booked, and the only unoccupied tables at that time belonged to our gourmet restaurant, L’Oiseau Blanc, which was also fully reserved tonight. She has always and will always be more than welcome with her family to the Peninsula.”