Romain Fornell

French and Spanish fine-dining kitchens shaped Romain Fornell through repetition, precision, and incremental authority. Early posts as chef at La Maison du Languedoc Roussillon, followed by collaborator roles at Michel Sarran and Alain Ducasse, put him in contact with standards that reward control over flourish. The throughline is less reinvention than accumulation: each room added a working layer to a style built on discipline and scale. From 2000 in Chaldette, Lozère, France, the title of chef / founder gave Romain Fornell responsibility for both kitchen output and the structure around it. That move marked the shift from working within established frames to helping define one, with Chaldette serving as a bridge between training, authorship, and operational command. In 2002, he took over diana restaurant; later renamed Caelis of Diana restaurant / Caelis, at El Palace Hotel, extending that same approach into a new setting without breaking from the methodical progression already in place. Today At Hotel Ohla Barcelona, Romain Fornell serves as director of all the gastronomic spaces, a role that is less about a single menu than about keeping multiple services aligned. The work sits at the level of systems: consistency, pacing, and the ability to hold one standard across different dining rooms. He is also culinary director of Hostal de La Gavina in S'Agaró, where the brief continues to center on coordination and finish. Across both positions, the craft is orchestration as much as cooking — setting the tone, maintaining discipline, and keeping the guest experience coherent from room to room. The continuity with his earlier career is clear: the same exacting habits, now applied across a wider field.