A French Couple Is Suing Airbnb For Ripping Off Their Home

An interior designer based in Paris says the design of her apartment was replicated in Airbnb’s San Francisco headquarters without her permission.

Zoé de Las Cases and her husband, Benjamin Dewé, run a small interior design firm out of their apartment in Paris. The couple travels frequently to Japan and the U.S. for work, so a few years ago, they decided to make a little money while they were gone by renting their place out on Airbnb. Here's what it looks like:

A picture of the home Benjamin Dewe and Zoe de Las Cases used to rent on Airbnb.

Zoe de las Cases

In 2012, the couple say, Airbnb contacted them and asked if they could host a Paris-office launch party in their home. The couple happily obliged. "We said great, we're designers," Dewé told BuzzFeed News. "We already used to rent our place for commercials." The party was a success.

But a year later, something strange happened. A friend who was familiar with the couple's Paris apartment congratulated them on their collaboration with Airbnb in San Francisco. He sent them pictures from a space in the company's headquarters designed to look just like their apartment. The problem was, Dewé and de Las Cases knew nothing about it.

When the design duo saw the extent to which their home had been replicated by Airbnb, they were immediately upset, Dewé said. Others began to notice as well.

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