According to the French newspaper Les Echos, every morning before going to work, the head of the Société Générale Bank headquarters descends the marble staircase leading to the bank's basement on Boulevard Haussmann in Paris. He dials the code, deactivates the jamming devices and inserts the key to open the 16-ton circular door leading to the next floors of the vault. "This is the only room in the world built by the French company Fichet. To this day, this room is impregnable," emphasized the head of the Société Générale headquarters, Bertrand Gilquart.

Behind the 40cm thick door is a second door, with two rectangular wings weighing 11 tons. This is called the “day gate”, and it leads to the safe floor, which is very spacious, paved with mosaic tiles – waterproof, moisture-proof tiles – and has a built-in elevator. On this floor are 399 shiny, sturdy steel cabinets, containing 8,117 chests. On the next floor is a room containing 22 iron cabinets, each with a volume of 7m3. It is extremely quiet here, barely disturbed by the noise of the subway, which can be guessed from behind the building walls.

According to Les Echos, the building was built in 1912. After being bought by the Société Générale Bank headquarters more than 100 years ago, only five full-time guards and the person holding the safe key were allowed to enter. Farid Ameur, a historian specializing in Société Générale Bank, said: During the Belle Époque period (meaning "Beautiful Times", used in Europe, from the late 19th century to 1914, before the First World War broke out), many wealthy customers came here to deposit their jewelry and valuable personal belongings to go to the Opera Garnier located across the street to watch a performance or go to a restaurant.

The 16-ton door leading to the century-old vault in the heart of Paris. Photo: lesechos.fr

Today, this vault still contains many chests containing money and valuables, even gold bars. Société Générale Bank is licensed to conduct gold transactions, a service that not all banks can provide. According to Bertrand Gilquart, customers who rent safes from Société Générale Bank also use them to store personal documents, real estate ownership documents, or other administrative documents. “Usually, the number of people depositing important documents increases before the holidays,” noted the head of Société Générale’s headquarters.

Today, half of the vaults are used to store money, and about a third are rented to store valuable works of art. On average, a safe costs 125 euros a year to rent, or 14,000 euros for a cabinet. There are two keys to the vault: one is the property of the bank and the other is the customer’s. However, customs or police can ask bank staff to open the safe if the renter is involved in a criminal case.

In addition, in this century-old basement there is another special room containing items that have been stored for a long time but no one has come to claim. After a certain period of time, the ownerless items will be transferred to the tax office for liquidation.

According to Bertrand Gilquart, no crisis has affected the operation of the secret vault in the past century. Now Société Générale Bank wants to expand its deposit service to provide stable value in the future.

PHUONG VU