École Ducasse and ENSP: Alain Ducasse's culinary campus at Meudon and the pastry school at Yssingeaux

École Ducasse is the one school on my list that carries a living chef’s name, which is both its draw and the question a student should put to it. A school that teaches Alain Ducasse’s method in a purpose built campus ten kilometers from Paris, with a pastry school in a château in the Haute-Loire, has a clear proposition; the question is what it offers beyond the name. This page sets out what the school documents about itself, where the record is thin, and what the chefs I interviewed say about learning from a master.

What the school is

The school’s own history, as summarized on the Campus France institution sheet, begins in 1999, when Ducasse’s training activity started; the pastry magazine So Good gives the same date for Ducasse Education. École Ducasse is now part of Sommet Education, the group that also owns Glion and Les Roches. The sheet, dated March 2024, counts about 1,200 students, half of them international, in classes of 10 to 18, taught by chef instructors who include Meilleurs Ouvriers de France and world champions. It won World’s Best Culinary Training Institution at the World Culinary Awards in 2023, an industry award rather than an accreditation.

There are three sites. The Paris Campus at Meudon-la-Forêt, about ten kilometers from central Paris, opened in 2020 and is the culinary arts school. The École Nationale Supérieure de Pâtisserie, the ENSP, at the Château de Montbarnier in Yssingeaux, about ninety minutes from Lyon, is the pastry, bakery, chocolate, confectionery and ice cream school. The Paris Studio in the sixteenth arrondissement serves amateurs and corporate events and is not a professional school.

The ENSP’s history is older than Ducasse’s involvement. The school was founded in 1984, a date the school’s own pages and a 2024 Sommet Education release on its fortieth anniversary both give. A September 2023 release says Alain Ducasse and the pastry chef Yves Thuriès took the school over in 2007. The pages I read do not say who founded it in 1984, so I do not. The 2023 extension, named the Campus Yves Thuriès, added 2,300 square meters, four laboratories, three classrooms and 36 student apartments, bringing the site to 7,000 square meters with twelve pastry laboratories, which the school describes as the largest campus in the world devoted to the pastry arts. The release counted more than 1,500 students a year at the ENSP from over 60 nationalities, with 17 pastry chef trainers and 25 academic staff.

Programs and how they are taught

The Paris Campus is a 5,000 square meter building with six technical kitchens for individual work and brigade service, a pastry laboratory, a bakery laboratory, seven classrooms, a sensory analysis room for food and wine, a knowledge center and an edible garden. The launch release of November 2020 said programs there run from two months to three years in French and English, in small cohorts. Adour, a gastronomic restaurant open to the public with a menu that follows the seasons, sits on the campus with a boutique for take away sales. The school’s pages describe internship opportunities in Paris but do not say how far students staff Adour, so I do not claim they do.

The degrees are the Bachelor in Culinary Arts and the Bachelor in French Pastry Arts, each three years, taught in English at the Paris Campus, combining practical training with courses in business, management and sustainability. Each includes three internships of 24 weeks, which is a larger share of the program in the industry than most schools require and the strongest feature of the design for a student who agrees with the chefs quoted below. The school describes the bachelors as industry recognized; the pages I read do not mention a French state accreditation or RNCP registration, and the Campus France sheet lists none. A student who needs a state recognized degree, for a visa, for further study or for a government employer, should ask the school directly and compare the answer with FERRANDI Paris and Institut Lyfe, whose bachelors are approved by the French higher education ministry.

The diplomas run from 8 to 22 weeks with at least 80 percent practical work, taught in English. The Culinary Arts Diploma at Paris is 22 weeks with an optional 13 week internship. At the ENSP the French Pastry Arts Diploma is 22 weeks with an optional 8 week internship, and the French Bakery Arts and French Chocolate and Confectionery Arts diplomas are 8 weeks each. A French and Italian Pastry Arts Diploma of 8 weeks is shared with ALMA in Parma. The 2023 ENSP release also lists a three year Diplôme Supérieur des Arts Pâtissiers, an eight month CAP Pâtissier and 68 short professional courses of two to three days. The Essentials and Expert Diploma programs are the career changer route.

One further program is worth knowing: a nine month course for job seekers in the Paris region, funded by the Île-de-France region and launched in May 2023, with a three month internship in a Ducasse group restaurant, as described by the region.

Who it is for and how to get in

The bachelor is for a high school graduate who wants three years in English, a long time in professional kitchens, and Ducasse’s method as the frame. The diplomas and Essentials are for the adult who wants a serious short course; the campus brochure counted 240 career changer students at Paris in 2025 against 336 bachelor students. The ENSP is for the person who knows pastry is the vocation.

The bachelor page says only that the programs are for motivated high school graduates, and the application page sends candidates to an online portal; the school’s pages I could read do not list age, language or diploma requirements, so I do not state them. Fees and intake dates are on the school’s site.

Alumni and outcomes

The school states a 98 percent graduate employment rate on its ENSP page without a period, and the Paris brochure reports a 100 percent pass rate for the 2025 cohorts. The ENSP names few alumni; its fortieth anniversary release mentions Emiri Tsushima, who works with Anne-Sophie Pic, and says the school has trained Meilleurs Ouvriers de France and world champions without naming them. Its director, Luc Debove, is himself a Meilleur Ouvrier de France and world ice cream champion. Independent outcome evidence of the kind Chef’s Pencil gathered for FERRANDI does not yet exist for École Ducasse, which opened its Paris campus six years ago; the school’s alumni community of about 10,000 is mostly made up of people who took short courses.

What the chefs in my books say

No chef in my books trained at École Ducasse, and given the school’s age that is no surprise. The connection the books do hold is to Ducasse the chef, and to the idea the school is built on, that a cook is formed by working under a master.

Guillaume Galliot, then executive chef of Caprice at Four Seasons Hotel Hong Kong, told me where his ambition began.

“When I was growing up I would follow Charles Barrier, Alain Ducasse, Joël Robuchon, and Paul Bocuse on TV. I would find every article I could about them to learn more about their ideas, passion and work.” Guillaume Galliot, in A Wealth of Insight (2019)

Galliot did not go to a Ducasse school; he found his way to the kitchen of the Pourcel brothers and decided there what kind of chef he wanted to be, and his advice to students is to look for mentors along the way.

Guy Savoy, a contemporary of Ducasse’s with three stars in Paris when we spoke, put the case for the apprenticeship over the classroom without qualification.

“The best way to hone your skillset is through apprenticeships. The acquisition of these precise crafts demands daily practice.” Guy Savoy, in A Wealth of Insight (2019)

For a pastry student, Martin Berasategui’s account of what French pastry training gave him is the closest thing in the books to a description of what the ENSP teaches.

“The most important thing I learned while studying with French pastry chefs is that they don’t improvise. Everything is well-measured and calculated.” Martin Berasategui, in A Wealth of Insight (2019)

These chefs make the case for the part of the École Ducasse design that is easiest to verify, the 72 weeks of internship in the bachelor, and they raise the question the school must answer for each student: which chef will you work under, and for how long.

How to decide

Choose École Ducasse if the Ducasse method is what you want to learn, if a long internship component matters more to you than a state degree, or if you are a career changer who wants a short, intensive course with a name behind it. Choose the ENSP if pastry, bakery or chocolate is the vocation and you want a campus built for nothing else. Ask the school where last year’s bachelor students did their 24 week internships and who supervised them, whether the bachelor carries any state recognition today, and how often students work service at Adour. If the answers are vague, weigh the school against FERRANDI and Institut Lyfe, whose degrees are approved by the ministry.

Then read the second chapter of The Luxury of Attention, on the apprenticeship, which is the argument for working under a master in any school’s clothing.

“Mastery is not self-taught. Every master in this book is the product of another master.” The Luxury of Attention (2026), Chapter 2

Sources

• Campus France: École Ducasse institution sheet (March 2024)
• École Ducasse: Paris Campus
• École Ducasse: École Nationale Supérieure de Pâtisserie
• École Ducasse: Bachelor programs
• École Ducasse: Diploma programs
• École Ducasse brochure: Paris Campus
• Hospitality Net: Sommet Education launches École Ducasse Paris Campus (November 2020)
• Hospitality Net: ENSP becomes the world’s largest campus dedicated to the pastry arts (September 2023)
• Hospitality Net: ENSP celebrates 40 years (June 2024)
• So Good magazine: École Nationale Supérieure de Pâtisserie
• Région Île-de-France: L’école d’Alain Ducasse accueille des jeunes éloignés de l’emploi (May 2023)
• Hospitality Net: Glion and Les Roches lead global hospitality education in the 2026 QS rankings