If 90 percent of life is just showing up, then the other 10 percent is showing up at the right time. Take the tricky case of the new Fifth Floor.

In recent years, the big-name restaurant in the Hotel Palomar has been a roller coaster with a revolving door: lots of ups and downs, lots of ins and outs. From George Morrone’s tuna-and–foie gras towers; to Laurent Gras’ lobster cappuccino; to Melissa Perello, who earned the restaurant a Michelin star; to Charlie Kleinman and Jake Des Voignes, who stepped up to the stove when Perello walked away—keeping track of the toques has been a difficult task.

Now the restaurant begins yet another act, with a revamped interior and another acclaimed chef. Gone is the hoary, zebra-patterned carpet. It’s been ripped out like a yellowed page from Architectural Digest, revealing hardwood floors that complement a lighter, brighter look. The lobby elevator, which once felt like a sci-fi teleporter that zipped you into another era, today opens up onto a modish dining room. Fifth Floor is still a hotel restaurant, but one that seems more sharply contemporary.

These, of course, are relatively dark times for what your grandma used to call “fine dining.” Economists sound queasy. Money’s tight. When ExxonMobil reports a paltry $11 billion in first-quarter profits, you can’t expect consumers to go hog wild at restaurants. Around San Francisco, food wags are asserting that we may have reached a low point for haute cuisine.

Into this cautious climate steps chef Laurent Manrique, also the executive chef at Aqua, who has embarked on another upscale trip. Under his command, Fifth Floor makes some room for casual encounters, with a café menu stocked with grass-fed burgers and steak frites. But the spirit of the restaurant remains formal, and its dining room is a beautifully intimate showcase for Manrique’s graceful, refined cooking.

The chef is a native of Gascony, a region whose geography rings familiar: mountains, forests, ocean. Paying homage to his homeland, Manrique draws heavily on tradition, calling out the classics while craft­ing modern dishes unashamed of their pedigree. On a recent evening, he served an old-world octopus salad, but ornamented it with a generous dollop of potato fondu adorned with sunchoke slivers, arranged to resemble the petals of a flower. As a cross-cultural touch, he drizzled the pretty, delicate dish with smoky, paprika-hinted Berber spice. Manrique plucked another appetizer from the recipe books, braising and puréeing hearts of romaine lettuce into a fresh spring soup. Chicken galantine was bathed tableside in the sweet, green broth, which enhanced a slice of truffed, deboned bird that arrived partly deconstructed, with a poached quail egg and carrots at its side.

Cuisine this elegant too often turns up against the deadly, blue-rinsed backdrop of a dining room that’s silent, save for the awkward clinking of silverware. And let’s be clear—Fifth Floor is far from a buoyant setting. But there is an energy to the evenings here, and it seems to stem from a personal attachment: a chef deeply invested in something new. Everything on the menu is delivered artfully and with precision, from time-worn dishes like poule au pot (poached chicken in its own juices), with a side of foie-gras stuffing, to mild, melting eel braised in red-wine sauce. Traditionally garnished with bacon or lardons, it’s offset here with a rich oxtail ragout.

According to an old joke, the only thing the French should host is an invasion. But the truth is that they’re pretty good at dinner, too. Fifth Floor’s staff are smart, attentive, and well trained in Gallic flourishes. Like the restaurant world’s equivalent of synchronized swimmers, they swoop around your table in seemingly choreographed motion, pouring redolent duck bouillon over duck confit croquettes, sneaking off with platters that once held corn polenta with minced rabbit stew.

The restaurant has refined the smallest details, from the cheese cart to the bread cart—which includes four choices, along with a pairing of goat’s and cow’s milk butters that are so delicious, they make you think dairy fetishism might be OK. The wine list is enormous and impressive, a catalog of hits largely from France and California, though it reads widely enough to resemble a sommelier’s written exam.

During my several explorations of the ambitious menu, I came across just one miss: a cold lobster salad, wrapped in lacy cuts of cucumber and splashed with a cucumber-almond gazpacho, that left a cloying taste. But it was long forgotten by the time dessert arrived: an airy pear soufflé and a wedge of gâteau basque, fluffed with egg whites and enriched by pastry cream—the embodiment of sweet simplicity and one of the finest desserts in town.

There’s little doubt that Manrique has a deft hand in the kitchen, but he can’t control the world beyond. Fifth Floor is a high-end hotel restaurant in a time of wallet watching, an expense-account indulgence christened at a moment when all of us except the Gettys are contemplating shredding our credit cards. Success depends on so many factors. Laurent Manrique has shown up—now he’ll have to wait and see if diners do the same.

Fifth Floor: 12 4th St. (at Market St.), S.F., 415-348-1555, $$$$ 3 Stars