Quand Paul rentre, il accroche son peignoir et son tablier derrière la porte de la cuisine.

Quand means when. Here it introduces a time clause:

• Quand Paul rentre = When Paul comes home / when Paul gets back

French often uses this structure just like English:

• Quand il pleut, je reste à la maison.
• When it rains, I stay home.

So the sentence is built as:

• Quand Paul rentre = the time/background
• il accroche... = the main action

Rentre is from rentrer, which often means:

• to come back
• to return
• to go back in
• very often, in everyday French, to come home

So Paul rentre usually suggests Paul is coming home / getting back.

That is why rentrer is very common in daily speech for returning home, work, school, etc.

French uses the present tense here just as English does:

• Quand Paul rentre = When Paul comes home

This is a general or habitual kind of statement, not necessarily something happening right now. It can mean whenever Paul comes home or when Paul gets home in a usual sequence of events.

French often uses the present tense for actions that regularly happen:

• Quand je rentre, je mange.
• When I get home, I eat.

French normally needs an explicit subject for each finite verb.

So in:

• Quand Paul rentre, il accroche...

you have:

• Paul as the subject of rentre
• il as the subject of accroche

English can sometimes sound more flexible, but in French you usually repeat the subject with a pronoun or noun when starting a new clause.

So il is required here.

Accroche comes from accrocher, which means:

• to hang
• to hook
• to attach

Here it means Paul hangs up his bathrobe and apron.

It is a very natural verb for putting clothes or objects on a hook, peg, or similar place.

Examples:

• Elle accroche son manteau. = She hangs up her coat.
• J’accroche les clés au mur. = I hang the keys on the wall.

French often repeats the possessive adjective before each noun:

• son peignoir et son tablier

This is the most natural and standard phrasing.

English often says:

• his bathrobe and apron

But French usually prefers:

• his bathrobe and his apron

even though English would not normally repeat his.

You may sometimes see one possessive covering two nouns, but repeating it is very common and often clearer.

Because both peignoir and tablier are masculine singular nouns.

In French, possessive adjectives agree with the thing possessed, not with the owner.

So:

• son peignoir because peignoir is masculine singular
• son tablier because tablier is masculine singular

It does not matter that Paul is male here. Even if the owner were a woman, it would still be:

• son peignoir
• son tablier

because the nouns themselves are masculine.

It can mean his, her, or even its, depending on context.

French son / sa / ses do not tell you the gender of the owner. They tell you the gender and number of the noun possessed.

So:

• son peignoir = his bathrobe or her bathrobe
• son tablier = his apron or her apron

In this sentence, we know it means his because the subject is Paul.

Derrière means behind.

So:

• derrière la porte = behind the door

This suggests the robe and apron are hanging on something located behind the kitchen door, such as a hook or hanger.

If you said sur la porte, that would mean on the door, which is a different image.

So derrière is chosen because of the location being behind the door, not directly on it.

French often expresses this idea with de:

• la porte de la cuisine = literally the door of the kitchen

This is the normal French way to say the kitchen door.

English often uses one noun directly before another:

• kitchen door

French usually does not do that in the same way, so it uses:

• porte de la cuisine
• table de la cuisine
• fenêtre de la chambre

Because in la porte de la cuisine, cuisine is a specific noun: the kitchen.

So:

• de la cuisine = of the kitchen

French often keeps the article in this kind of phrase:

• la porte de la maison = the door of the house
• la fenêtre de la voiture = the car window / the window of the car

You are not just saying kitchen in a general adjectival way; you are saying the kitchen.

French usually puts location expressions after the verb and object:

• il accroche son peignoir et son tablier derrière la porte de la cuisine

This follows a very common pattern:

• subject + verb + object + place

For example:

• Elle pose son sac sur la table.
• Il met ses chaussures dans l’entrée.

So the structure here is very normal French word order.

Yes. In a sentence like this, the present tense often suggests a habitual or repeated action.

So it can sound like:

• Whenever Paul comes home, he hangs his bathrobe and apron behind the kitchen door

If you wanted to talk about one single past event, French would use a different tense, for example:

• Quand Paul est rentré, il a accroché...

But as written, it sounds like a routine or general fact.

They can both relate to returning, but they are not always interchangeable.

Rentrer often means:

• to go back in
• to come back
• to come home

It is very common for everyday returns home or back inside somewhere.

Retourner more broadly means:

• to return
• to go back
• sometimes to turn over

In this sentence, rentre is the natural choice because it suggests Paul is coming home / getting back.

Yes. Un peignoir usually means a:

• bathrobe
• dressing gown
• sometimes robe, depending on context

It is a masculine noun:

• le peignoir
• un peignoir
• son peignoir

So the sentence is talking about a piece of clothing Paul hangs up when he gets home.

Yes, tablier is masculine:

• le tablier

It means apron.

So:

• son tablier = his apron

Because it is masculine singular, the possessive is son.

If you changed Paul to a woman’s name, the possessives could stay exactly the same if the objects stayed the same, because peignoir and tablier are masculine nouns.

For example:

• Quand Marie rentre, elle accroche son peignoir et son tablier derrière la porte de la cuisine.

That would mean:

• When Marie comes home, she hangs her bathrobe and apron behind the kitchen door.

Notice:

• elle changes because the subject is female
• but son peignoir and son tablier stay the same

A rough pronunciation guide is:

• Kahn Pol rahntr, eel ah-krosh son peh-nywar ay son tah-blee-ay deh-ree-air lah port duh lah kwee-zeen

A few useful notes:

• Quand sounds roughly like kahn
• Paul sounds like Pol
• rentre has a nasal vowel in ren
• peignoir is roughly peh-nywar
• cuisine is roughly kwee-zeen

The exact sounds are best learned by listening, especially the nasal vowels and French r.