European etiquette and refinement, kept in the family
Institut Solène
A private European institute for households. We hold a family’s standard of conduct in one place, and keep the record of it across generations.
“Manners are not a performance for strangers. They are the way a household holds itself when nobody is watching.”
The north star of the institute
What this is
Institut Solène is a private European institute for households. It holds a family’s standard of conduct in one place: how the house greets and introduces, seats and serves a table, writes and replies, dresses for which occasion, receives guests and staff, and how it teaches all of that to the next generation.
Members keep a Generational Handbook that is versioned and printable, a curriculum in six strands, and an annual record of what was practised and what changed. It is not a course and it awards no certificates.
The customer
The family, the house, and the standard it keeps. Not the individual.
The record
The Generational Handbook: versioned, dated, printable, with its own edit history.
The method
Six strands, seven studios, seven voices that write only from your own stored record.
What we do not do
No titles, no credentials, no invented members or events, no scoring of bodies.
The product
Not a course. A record.
Every family holds a standard. Most of it lives in one person’s head, and leaves with them. The Generational Handbook is where a household writes it down: the greeting, the table, the letter, the dress, the way staff and guests are received, and the few things this house never does.
It is versioned and dated. When the standard changes, the older wording stays in the archive. A grandchild can read what the house stood for in 2026, and why.
Handbook — a household’s standing sections
- 01How we greet and introduce
- 02How we host and are hosted
- 03How we write and reply
- 04How we dress for which room
- 05How we receive staff and guests
- 06What we never do
Written by the household. Answered by the seven voices, always from what the house itself has stored.
The curriculum
The six strands.
Evergreen lessons, citable, with reading time and key points. The house practises a strand, and the handbook records what it settled on.
Presence and introductions
Arriving, being introduced, precedence, the bearing a house is known for.
IIThe table
Seating, service, the order of a dinner, hosting and being hosted.
IIICorrespondence
Invitations, acceptances, regrets, thank-yous, condolences, and their digital equivalents.
IVPresentation and dress
Dress codes decoded, restraint, what belongs in which room and season.
VTravel and receiving
Being received abroad, house guests, hotels, tipping and small courtesies.
VIFamily and legacy
Teaching the standard across generations, and keeping its record.
The seven house voices
Seven voices, one house.
Solène Marchetti
The Directrice
Béatrice Okonjo
The Table Mistress
Ingrid Lindqvist
The Correspondent
Adrien Voss
The Boardroom
Clémence Aubert
The Wardrobe Room
Henrik Solberg
The Traveller
Anneke de Vries
The Family Steward
Every one of the seven is an AI voice of Institut Solène. Each is framed by a role, a voice, a refusal and one closing action, and each answers from the household’s own handbook, chapters and progress.
The rooms
Seventeen rooms, one house.
The standard
- The Generational HandbookThe living standard of the house: how we greet, host, write, dress, receive, and what we never do. Versioned and printable.
- The Six StrandsEvergreen lessons across the six strands, with reading time and key points.
- Family ChaptersGuidance banded by age, written for the guardian to deliver. No accounts for minors.
- The Protocol LibraryForms of address, the shape of a formal letter, the running order of a dinner, variation by country.
The rooms
- The Table RoomSeating plans, order of service, conversation, host and guest duties, wine courtesy.
- The Letter RoomDrafts for invitations, acceptances, regrets, thank-yous and condolences. Drafts only: you send.
- The Wardrobe RoomDress codes decoded, restraint, packing for a house, a season and a room.
- The Guest BookWho came, what they were like, what to serve them next time. Read by the table room and the occasion brief.
- The BoardroomMeeting conduct, introductions round a table, being new on a board, disagreement with composure.
- The Travelling HouseBeing received and receiving abroad, house guests, hotels, yachting and aviation courtesy.
The practice
- The Practice RoomWeekly drills with a one-line self-check and a household streak. For the house, not for a score.
- The Seven StudiosTable geometry, the invitation decoder, dress codes, gifting and courtesy, and the rest.
- The Solène AssessmentA private self-audit across the six strands. Not a qualification, never ranked against others.
- Two-Minute RescuesForty awkward moments, searchable by situation, each with the exact words to say and the one move that makes it worse.
The house
- The Seven VoicesEach of the seven, and each able to write from your household’s own record.
- The City CirclesMember-declared circles by city. Members may create their own gathering and invite whom they choose.
- The Household BriefOne printable page: the house standard for new staff, a guest, a housesitter, a new partner.
- The Family YearA printable annual record: what was taught, what was practised, what changed, what comes next.
- The Handover LetterWhat this house believes, what to keep, what to forgive and what was never resolved, versioned like the handbook.
- The Remembrance CalendarThe names this house keeps, with an annual prompt for a line of memory. Private, never shared, never ranked.
- The House SealA monogram for the handbook cover and the letterhead. We invent no heraldry and grant no arms.
- The Household LedgerHousehold, members, guardian controls, export and deletion.
The city circles
Etiquette weather, city by city.
London
United Kingdom
Monaco
Principality of Monaco
Paris
France
Geneva
Switzerland
New York
United States
Dubai
United Arab Emirates
Tokyo
Japan
Singapore
Singapore · Hong Kong
Circles are member-declared. Members may create their own gathering and invite whom they choose. We publish no invented members, no invented events and no venues.
Membership
Three tiers. Chosen once.
There is no monthly plan. The Household opens the institute for a year; the Family Seat and the Institut Circle are acquired once and kept.
The Household
$390
per year
One household, opened for a year.
- The six strands
- The Generational Handbook
- The Practice Room
- The Protocol Library
- The Letter Room
The Family Seat
$1,850
one time
Everything above, kept for life.
- Everything in The Household, for life
- Family Chapters
- The Household Brief
- The Family Year
- The handbook archive
The Institut Circle
$6,500
one time
Several households, or a family office.
- Up to twelve households on one Circle
- Private briefs
- Priority on new strands
- Everything in The Family Seat
The Threshold
You can feel the house before you pay for it.
An account that is not yet a membership sees the arrival room, one lesson from the first strand, and a blank handbook to try. It never expires.
In one paragraph, for the record
Institut Solène is a private European institute for households, not for individuals. A household writes down the standard it keeps — greeting, table, correspondence, dress, travel, receipt, the year — versions that record over time, and teaches it to the next generation. Membership is annual or one-time, never monthly, and nothing is awarded.