As captain of the Café de Paris at Montreal’s glamorous Ritz-Carlton hotel, Dimitri Dimitrov says he used to watch the snow fall outside his window and dream of California.
In his late 20s at the time, Dimitrov was already a stand-out in the service industry. He’d rapidly worked his way through the ranks at the Ritz-Carlton, a hotspot for Canadian elite such as Pierre Trudeau and Rene Levesque. Even then, Dimitrov was setting his sights on the stars.
“I would dream about California, and I would dream about if I could do this among the stars in Beverly Hills,” Dimitrov told CTVNews.ca.
Some 30 years later, Dimitrov is perhaps the most famous maître d’ in Hollywood.
“Everyone knows who he is,” the Sunset Tower’s Hotel Ambassador, Tim Cunningham, said. “Hollywood knows him as Dimitri, the maître d’ to the stars.”
Six nights a week, Dimitrov spends his evenings at the Tower Bar, a ritzy, walnut-panelled lounge inspired by Old Hollywood. Dressed in a freshly pressed suit, his dark hair slicked back, Dimitrov keeps a perfectionist’s eye on the bar’s operations, ensuring everything meets his high standards.
“He’s impeccable. His attention to detail is over and above,” Cunningham said. “His mannerisms, the way he runs the room, it’s like he floats.”
These days, Dimitrov regularly serves celebrities including Johnny Depp and Jennifer Aniston, whose wedding he was recently rumoured to be organizing (Dimitrov says the tabloid suspicions are wrong.) But, the maître d’ says, he owes his success to his past.
Dimitrov was born in Macedonia. He left the country at 19 to work as a bus boy in London, and then moved to Montreal when he was 21.
“I come from a very poor country. I was young, a young man full of optimism and full of energy,” Dimitrov said. “I was fascinated by Canada, especially in Quebec at that time—the Quiet Revolution, the culture.”
He started as a server at the Ritz-Carlton and quickly worked his way up to the position of captain at the hotel’s Café de Paris.
In those days, Dimitrov said, Montreal was “a city of style.” And at the heart of the city was the Ritz-Carlton, a place frequented by prominent Canadians.
Pierre Trudeau would stop by “five or six times a year,” Dimitrov said, and he remembers always having to change the ashtray for René Lévesque. Robert Bourassa also frequented the restaurant, and, in 1976, Dimitrov was part of the team that served Queen Elizabeth II when she visited the city with Prince Philip.
It was during his Ritz-Carlton days, Dimitrov said, that he learned the “protocol” of serving.
“Those eight years in Montreal were in my 20s and that is when you are more impressionable, when you develop your character, your taste, and your profession too,” he said. “In Montreal I got this classic service education.”
He took this training with him when he moved to California, first to a restaurant on Rodeo Drive, and then to Diaghilev, a now-closed caviar bar frequented by Sean Penn and Johnny Depp.
Dimitrov’s meticulous service and charm caught the eye of designer Tom Ford, who, legend has it, scribbled Dimitrov’s phone number on a napkin and handed it to Jeff Klein, who was opening a new hotel and looking for somebody to run the restaurant.
“Tom Ford gave him my telephone number and said, ‘There’s only one man for you that can run the place for you, it’s Dimitri,’ ” Dimitrov said.
Klein called Dimitrov, the two agreed to meet for coffee, and soon, Dimitrov had a new job at the Sunset Tower Hotel’s Tower Bar.
“That’s the beginning of this amazing story right now,” Dimitrov said. “The success we’ve had in the last 11 years has been just dreamlike.”
To Dimitrov, there is “magic” at the Tower Bar every evening, as VIPs sip on cocktails and socialize, creating an atmosphere that can’t be found anywhere else.
“It’s creating this rare atmosphere,” he said. “It can happen only in Hollywood.”
As Klein prepares to open another exclusive spot in the next year and a half, Cunningham said he and Dimitrov are also preparing to bring their talents to the new venture.
The opening date is yet to be determined, but one thing can be certain: wherever and whenever Dimitrov goes, he will bring along the impeccable sense of service he developed in Montreal.
“Today, they say this is ‘old school,’” Dimitrov said. “But there is nothing ‘old school’ about perfection.”
