HotelChatter

Tags: Paula Abdul Hotels / Manhattan Hotels / Snapshot / Intercontinental Hotels / → All Tags

Snapshot :: The Barclay Intercontinental is Totally a Paula Abdul Hotel

Where: 111 E 48th St [map], New York, NY, United States, 10017

Here's a Paula Abdul Hotel for the books: the Barclay Intercontinental in Manhattan. You know what kind of hotels we're talking about -- we officially define them as "old luxury hotels still coasting by on favorable press from the 1980s and early 1990s; old-looking from the inside and out. A few of them may have had some minor up-keeping done but not necessarily for the better."

Check out this shot of a room at the Barclay from our recent stay in Manhattan: those curtains! The yellow bedskirt! And, one thing you can't get from the pic: the overwhelming musty smell in the room, which smelled sort of like our college bathroom's shower stall that we never cleaned.

Tags: Los Angeles Hotels / Travel and Leisure / Hotel Rankings / Paula Abdul Hotels / → All Tags

Why Do Travel+Leisure Readers Love the Hotel Bel-Air So Much?

Where: 701 Stone Canyon Road [map], Los Angeles, CA, United States, 90077

So, listen, Travel + Leisure readers: we have a bone to pick with you. You seem to think quite highly of the Hotel Bel-Air, and frankly, we're not quite getting it.

See, not only did you rank the hotel #1 in Los Angeles in the World's Best Awards, but you also seem to think it is among one of the top three hotels in the United States. Really, though?

Look, we get that the grounds are gorgeous and all, but we don't sleep outside. The hotel's interior is where we spend the most time. We sleep in the rooms and eat in the dining room, you know?

All we're saying is that last time we were there, things looked a wee bit, well, to put it delicately: in need of an update.

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Tags: Cipriani Hotels / Laura Landro / Venice Hotel Reviews / Orient-Express Hotels / Paula Abdul Hotels / → All Tags

Hotel Cipriani :: That "Anniversary Facelift" Can't Come Soon Enough

Where: Giudecca 10, Venice, Italy, 30133

Introducing our first submission for a Paula Abdul Hotel.

Earlier this month we wrote about how the Hotel Cipriani in Venice was undergoing an 50th "anniversary facelift", but too bad the Wall Street Journal's Finicky Traveler got there before the new look was completed.

Our fave hotel critic Laura Landro spent a few nights there and the opening of her review says it all:

Our suite at Venice's legendary Hotel Cipriani has stained mauve carpet, ratty faux-bamboo furniture and a platform bed looking into a whirlpool tub-for-two that seems not to have been scrubbed out since the 1970s. We feel positively transported -- to a honeymoon motel in the Poconos.

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