Oooh, La La

Starwood Capital Group LLC (Greenwich, Conn.), the property investment firm, has acquired a controlling stake in Taittinger S.A. (Rheims, France) and Société du Louvre (Paris), related French luxury companies that own the crystal maker Baccarat and the landmark Hôtel de Crillon in Paris, for about $1.5 billion.

The Taittinger family, which owns Taittinger and controls 53 percent of Société du Louvre’s voting stock, put the companies up for auction several months ago. In addition to Baccarat and the hotel, the companies own Annick Goutal perfumes; Campanile, a budget hotel chain; and Taittinger Champagne.

Starwood Capital, unrelated to Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide Inc. (White Plains, N.Y.), except through its founder, ceo Barry Sternlicht, won the auction against rival suitors that included The Carlyle Group (Washington, D.C.), TheBlackstone Group L.P. (New York), Wendel Investissement (Paris) and PAI Partners (Paris).

Sternlicht said he was drawn to the collection of hotels and other assets because they had strong luxury brands and reputation. He suggested he might try to use the Hôtel de Crillon brand to build a high-end luxury hotel chain in Europe. He also said that he planned to invest heavily in renovating and refurbishing the hotels, a task he noted was very difficult for a public company because of the shorter-term focus to meet quarterly earnings targets.

Société du Louvre’s collection of hotels includes nearly 800 economy hotels (operated through subsidiary Envergure Group) and more than 90 luxury hotels and restaurants (through subsidiary Concorde Hotels Group).