*Here, too, Bernard was following the path of his model, Bocuse, whose restaurant is open 365 days a year—but Bocuse has the entire city of Lyon as a clientele base (not to speak of the hungry and curious from every other corner of the globe, who visit his place the way they visit Madame Tussaud’s waxworks or the Eiffel Tower), and he employs an oversized staff to serve them all. Bernard’s comparable confrères all allow themselves a little reasonable breathing time. Guy Savoy takes the month of August, and the Christmas and New Year periods off, and closes two days a week. Michel Troisgros closes for four weeks of the year plus two days a week. In winterbound Laguiole, Michel Bras shuts down entirely from November through March.