A hotel just outside Chicago got sold today which normally wouldn't be newsworthy to us but it was called The Purple Hotel, our favorite color!
While it was once classy in the 1960s it became a den of debauchery, the site of a mob hit, and home to both sex and rodent parties. (Although not at the same time...we don't think so at least.) In other words, it was like totally hip.
The hotel was initially the Lincolnwood Hyatt House, then turned into a Radisson then a Ramada before it became so awful that no franchise wanted to be a part of it. The Sun-Times writes of the final hotel name, The Purple Hotel:
By that name, it was relying on such events as the Midwest Fetish Fair & Marketplace for business, and the police regularly were called to the hotel to quiet disturbances.
The hotel used to segregate the sex parties from other guests, but a former general manager once told the Sun-Times that complaints arose from people who "got on the wrong elevator."
Now, the hotel will be demolished and replaced with some retail/residential mixed-use building. Boring! We sorta think Ian Schrager needs to drop this Edition Hotel business and launch a chain of Purple Hotels. Bring back hedonistic hotels Ian!
· Attorneys now threatening TripAdvisor reviewers who write bad things. Oy. [LA Times] · NBA baller Richard Jefferson formally charged with choking man at boutique hotel Graves 601. [Minneapolis Star-Tribune] · RIP: Gridskipper is moving to Curbed. [Gridskipper] · The Sheraton Gateway LAX hotel is starting JetSet Sundays poolside with airline-inspired drinks. [Jaunted]
Page Six has the scoop on a new article from Rolling Stone about a high-end call girl service that once sent pretty girls to allegedly "work with" Charlie Sheen at a hotel in Santa Monica last year.
Sheen's rep told the gossip column, "This is an old, old, old story." But he didn't quite deny it.
Thus, a new version of Guess The Hotel begins. This one is slightly different because whereas in previous editions we held the answer, this time we're asking you to put your guesses forth as to where high-end call girls would go to service clients.
To help you out we've come up with a list of potential call girl hotels in Santa Monica. We've also mapped out these locations so as to give you a better idea of where they are. And because we like maps!
*Note: We aren't saying Charlie Sheen definitely took call girls to these hotels. This is purely a fictional fantasy map.
If you've ever wondered about the inside life of a concierge at a pricey five-star hotel, you'll be keen to hear about the day UK Times reporter Matt Rudd spent playing the role of a trainee concierge at London's exclusive Jumeirah Carlton Tower.
His pre-concierge-experience training was not much more than learning the phrase "Certainly, sir, I'll look into that and call you straight back." Rudd then watched the three experienced concierges in action, dealing with guest dramas like booking last minute tables at exclusive restaurants, arranging an urgent car to the airport and needing a pencil sharpener.
Probably Rudd's most interesting learning point was the code for ordering a prostitute: "Can I have another pillow?" He also met a regular guest who had a habit of asking strange questions and walking away. All part of the fun of a day's work.
If you're not the kind of person who's familiar with guests able to spend nearly £100,000 (US$200,000) on a hotel bill (and we're certainly not), then the life of a concierge at a place like this would definitely be pretty intriguing. But we're not sure we could handle the stress, or be able to tell the difference between a guest wanting an actual pillow and wanting something else.
There's a silver lining in the Eliot Spitzer-HookerGate after all.
The hotel which was the scene of the tryst with call girl Ashley Dupree, The Mayflower Hotel, is doing amazing business with its gift shop wares. The Daily News reports:
Everything from teddy bears ($18.99) to terry-cloth bathrobes ($69.99) marked with the Mayflower's logo has been flying off the shelves of the luxury hotel's tiny gift shop, [hotel spokesman Mark] Andre said.
And people are a little zealous about getting some other mementos from the hotel. Someone even pried off the original Room 871 tag from the wall, forcing the hotel to put up a replacement tag. Yeah, that's a little crazy.
Another service at the hotel that will probably do big business? The weekend romantic getaway which the hotel spokesperson also plugged. It's not just for couples of the traditional sort. Call girls and johns welcome too!
Eliot Spitzer was widely known for his overly aggressive personality during his tenure as governor of New York--who can forget his "I'm a f***ing steamroller" comment, uttered when he wasn't getting what he wanted out of the New York State Legislature during his first few months as governor? So it makes sense that a man so entitled would choose one of Washington's most prestigious (and scandalous) hotel addresses, the Mayflower Hotel, to conduct an extra-marital affair.
Spitzer's replacement, David Paterson, has yet to outline his agenda as the state's new governor, but The New York Times has taken the liberty of reviewing the hotel where Paterson held his rendezvous with a woman who was not his wife: The Days Hotel Broadway on Broadway and 94th Street. If the property provides similar insight into Paterson's political personality, New Yorkers are in for an interesting tenure.
The Times reporter was only allowed to inspect the lobby--apparently all 250 rooms were booked full for the Easter holiday--and came up with this assessment:
"...[I]n light of the hotel's recent brush with fame, [the lobby] seemed rich with metaphors of deceit. The fake fireplace has an imitation stone mantle and sits near vases filled with plastic flowers. And among the faux books in the sham library were the disembodied spines of several copies of the politician's bible, 'The Prince' by Niccolò Machiavelli."
Now, we don't know which is worse: A governor who hires a high-class prostitute for a tryst in a $400-per-night hotel room in Washington's Mayfair Hotel, or a governor who takes his mistress to a Days Inn in the less tony section of New York's Upper West Side?
Following revelations that high-priced call girl "Kristen," a.k.a. Ashley Alexandra Dupré, met Client No. 9, alias Eliot Spitzer, at Washington's Mayflower Hotel, The New York Times has written a story that paints the property as an upscale bordello.
The article details the various dalliances and scandals that have gone down at the Marriott-owned property, naming it as a favorite of President Kennedy for his numerous indiscretions; as the place former Washington Mayor Marion S. Barry Jr. smoked crack; and where House members interviewed Monica Lewinsky during the impeachment of Bill Clinton--specifically, in the hotel's 10th-floor Presidential Suite. Oh, the irony.
Of course the daily comings and goings of the hotel, just steps from the White House, aren't all so lascivious. J. Edgar Hoover lunched there every day for 20 years and Franklin Roosevelt penned his first inaugural speech in Room 776, The Times points out.
But who cares? The details on how the hotel staff looked the other way at such gossip-worthy comings and goings are far more interesting. "We are in the business of selling rooms," an anonymous former manager of the Mayflower told the paper, "[a]nd the escort services are in the business of keeping our guests happy."
All of this leaves us wondering: How will this tally sheet affect the Mayflower's reputation? Will the Mayflower clean house of its staff? Or will the hotel become a pit stop on the "Sex Lives of Politicians" tour?
So Eliot Spitzer chose the Mayflower for his sneaky after-work business with an Emperors Club VIP prostitute.
It's not an easy question - where does a well-known man take a high-class hooker so that no-one recognises either him or what he's up to?
A hotel's got to have at least the basics: a large bed, a good shower, flattering bathrobes, soundproofed walls, a well-stocked mini-bar, some kind of music system and discreet staff. Got to be located near enough to the city centre to be easy to find and quick to leave, but not be so conspicuous that everyone can see guests' comings and goings.
And an Emperors Club VIP prostitute ain't gonna be happy with a cheap motel - she's wanting jacuzzi tubs, top quality toiletries and champagne on ice at the very least. You can't google a hotel like that.
So where would a Parisian version of Eliot Spitzer take his madame for a few hours?
The Examiner's Yeas and Nays political blog scored pictures of room 871 at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, DC which has now become infamous as the tryst location for Gov. Eliot Spitzer and a high-priced prostitute.
And we know at least one of you were wondering yesterday if he checked in under a fake name and it turns out he was a fan of the moniker of George Fox which is actually the name of one of Spitzer's friends and donors. Classy guy.
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by juliana
There's a silver lining in the Eliot Spitzer-HookerGate after all.
