Robert V. Camuto

 Special to the Washington Post

One of Paris's newest, hottest dining experiences will not last. And it's not for lack of interest. In fact, the competition is fierce for only 12 places at lunch and dinner and the chance to dine on modern interpretations of French classics while feasting on unbeatable views over the Seine.

So why will Nomiya close? Because it was designed to be temporary: a one-year project (July 2009 to July 2010, though it has been extended through September) housed in a futuristic steel, glass and aluminum "capsule" perched on a rooftop with the Eiffel Tower in full frontal view. It's not really a restaurant; it's more of an art-meets-gastronomy installation, and the Internet-only reservations go as quickly as they become available a month in advance.

The concept of the project, broadly called "Art Home," was for multimedia artist Laurent Grasso and his architect brother, Pascal, to design the dining capsule and the kitchens on the upper floors of the Palais de Tokyo, a monumental structure built for the 1937 World's Fair and reopened in 2002 as an edgy contemporary art space. Gilles Stassart, a daring young Burgundian chef, was charged with assembling a team to create five-course meals every evening for a year without ever repeating a dish. (Everyone eats the same market menu. Repetitions are allowed at lunch.) Electrolux, the Swedish appliance brand seeking to hip up its image, partly foots the bill as sponsor.

Just like an art exhibition, the whole works, including the rectangular roof capsule, will be removed at the end of the run.

I'd tried repeatedly and unsuccessfully to make reservations on Nomiya's bilingual Web site, where every day at 10 a.m. (3 a.m. EST) reservations open for the same date a month later. Whenever I pounced on my keyboard at that hour, it seemed that the places disappeared within seconds. (I later learned that the trick is to persist for an hour, as the system doesn't allow two people to reserve at once and shows Nomiya "full" if someone else is in the booking process.)

I did notice spots available for a cooking workshop, and I purchased two for my wife and me at about $38 apiece. One month later, we arrived at noon in the Palais lobby. A dozen of us -- all women except for me and Jean-Luc, the other man who came with his wife -- were led upstairs to the Art Home/Nomiya kitchens, a slick all-white culinary utopia. A huge central island under a loft skylight was ringed by large open counter spaces, induction cooktops and built-in ovens. The walls displayed a painted design of a continuous narrow looping orange ribbon and a series of signs announcing the French words for "flavor," "conviviality," "creativity" and "sensuality."

Judith, a rail-thin Nomiya chef with a shock of bright red hair, directed us to our aprons (which we kept as souvenirs) and to the sink for hand-washing.

She then quickly ran down our recipes, which had been served to Nomiya guests the previous evening, and pointed out three stations: for meat, vegetables and dessert. Drawers opened and knives and cooking utensils appeared. And for the next two hours, with Judith's guidance, we peeled, chopped, sauteed, boiled, mixed, caramelized, squeezed, crumbled and whipped our way through the menu of slow-cooked veal cheeks in red wine (Judith had started stewing early that morning) baked with cinnamon-cookie crust, a sweet potato cream, heirloom turnips caramelized with orange juice and pineapple-basil tarte Tatin.

As a health-conscious American who lives in France's olive oil belt, I was surprised by the amount of butter used in everything at every stage of cooking and stunned that not one of my Parisian classmates breathed a word about all the cholesterol. (No one except Jean-Luc, who had a modest paunch, seemed to be carrying any excess fat.)

The last thing on the program, which took up most of the third hour, was to plate the meal and eat it with glasses of the house red Bordeaux. The meat melted in my mouth, though the sweet cookie crust added little; the vegetables were perfectly tasty and rich (all the butter) and the combination of basil and pineapples in the dessert inspired thoughts of more herb-fruit combinations. Seconds of food and wine were passed around.

After lunch we were led on a tour through the roof garden and up a set of outdoor metal stairs to the Nomiya capsule. The single long white table and the interior lit by the violet glow of high-tech lighting seemed to float above the Seine: a cloud to which I hope to return. For Nomiya excels at the thing that gives dining and travel true value: It offers an experience that's not easily forgotten.

Camuto is the author of "Corkscrewed: Adventures in the New French Wine Country."