André Quidu (1945) is the owner of the legendary Croissant Show, located in the Plaça de la Constitució, next to the Mercat Vell. Born in Guéméné-sur-Scorff, a village in Brittany, he came to Ibiza in 1979, initially just to spend a holiday with his family. But he fell in love with the island, which he has seen a lot of change since then. His place has always been a meeting point for people from all walks of life. Now he wants to retire “as soon as possible”, but his café-croissant shop will remain an icon. So will he, who jokes that his characteristic moustache is due to the fact that his mother was Dalí’s neighbour and that he was born with it.
André Quidu posing for Diario de Ibiza, yesterday in his café. Toni Escobar.
What were your first years in Ibiza like?
I came for a month’s holiday, not to stay. I came with my wife and my 11 year old daughter and my 9 year old son, and we went to my friend Pedro’s house in es Codolar. It was a house without electricity or water. Pedro lived with Jordi, who was the boyfriend of a friend of mine who had spent a few months on holiday in Ibiza, and he told us it was no problem for us to rent the whole month.
And how did the idea of setting up this business come about?
It was a coincidence, because my first ten years on the island I was doing rather artistic things, selling paintings, paint or wooden seagulls. And I had a French friend who told me he was going to set up a French ice cream and bakery, and he did it here, in this square, but it didn’t work and after a year he wanted to sell it. I told two friends about it and they lent me money to take over the shop. I didn’t have a penny, because at that time we tried to work as little as possible and we lived better, because you could live on three bucks in Ibiza. A week later I started working here and I was the only foreigner in the neighbourhood, but the Ibizans were the core customers, it was winter. When Easter came, the Ánfora disco opened, and one morning, while I was cooking, I saw a group of guys coming down from Dalt Vila laughing a lot. They smelled the baguettes and croissants that were being made, and wanted to come in. And that’s where it all started with the young clientele. Business started to pick up. The first summer there were only a few tables, but there were always a lot of people and there was a lot of noise, they even cut off the street because of all the people who came here.
It must have been very strange to see that mix of people from the island with those who came to party in the morning.
Of course, and the night showmen came, practically naked. One day there were two Ibicencan women in the cafeteria having a cortado and next to them a man with only big platforms and a thong, and I told them to turn around. But they weren’t shocked, they were laughing their heads off. Then it was the beginning of the KU era, and there was a lot of movement of very crazy people. There weren’t even closing times for discotheques, they closed when they felt like it. The Croissant Show has had to expand since then.
What celebrities have passed through here?
The German singer Nico, who was a friend of the band The Velvet Underground, also DiCaprio, Zidane, who came here very often… they have all been here. The other day there was Vanessa Paradis, Johnny Depp’s ex-wife. Also the Italian fashion designer Giorgio Armani, Jean-Paul Gaultier, David Guetta, who when he started as a DJ came to the Croissant Show with another famous DJ.
Any anecdotes with any of them?
I have one with DiCaprio, two or three years ago, because I was having breakfast on the terrace and he was wearing a brown cap and sunglasses. I had not even realized it was him, and he came in to buy a baguette at the cashier and pay the bill. I stared at him and was going to ask him if we knew each other, but in the end I didn’t say anything. The next day, Diario de Ibiza reported that he was on the island and in a small photograph DiCaprio was passing by the intersection of Café Mar and Sol with the Croissant Show baguette under his arm.
For the full article, please visit Diario de Ibiza website here.