You know the scene. You open the door to your brand new hotel room, run over to the window, open the blinds and bam, you are hit with the anti-view. Maybe you are looking down a dirty alley, witnessing a drug deal, staring at an air shaft in the face, or seeing a brick wall. Whatever you are viewing it is not extremely pleasurable. Help out your fellow hotel mavens by uploading your anti-views to the HotelChatter/Flickr photo pool, or by sending the photo along to us. Remember to tell us the name of the hotel and the room number with the not-so-easy-on-the-eyes view.
We've had a lot of talk about the Thompson Beverly Hills Hotel which is finally more-or-less open for business. We say more-or-less thanks to the first guest review we read on TripAdvisor earlier this week which said the hotel wasn't that honest about the status of construction. (The guest's originally booked room wasn't ready and a second choice was missing a TV.)
While this isn't technically an anti-view from a guestroom, it is the state of the construction on the rooftop deck which should be transformed into a pool/lounge bar areay by February. As always with Thompson, will wait and see.
We knew that Monday was a tentative D-Day for the Thompson Beverly Hills Hotel to open, one of the many expected opening dates since Thompson Hotels first announced the project.
But the hotel has already been half-open to guests for a few months while construction is continuing. The rooms are renovated in the new Dodd Mitchell style, but nothing else is completely finished.
Although Thompson said they would open first on Nov. 5th then later on November 19th, one HotelChatter Maven VickyHsu bravely took a gamble on staying November 20th. And guess what? The place is still under construction. Her full review after the jump.
We heard word through the hotel industry grapevine that Thompson Beverly Hills while under construction has two full floors of finished rooms.
Since we just drove by the place on Tuesday and it looked like this (above) we could hardly believe the whispers. So we gave the hotel's reservations line a call and we learned that YES, the place is OPEN. Although, it's operating under the Beverly Pavilion name, not yet Thompson Hotels.
The kind lady who answered our call said that the rooms have been renovated and upgraded (designed by Dodd Mitchell) but do not feature any of the fancy Thompson amenities such as Sferra linens or posh toiletries. Prices range from $129 to $189 depending on occupancy and can be booked online at the Beverly Pavilion website.
What a deal! If you don't mind construction that is....The hotel is supposed to be fully completed sometime Fall 2007. Remember, Jason's precious granite was held hostage by Colombian guerrillas.
An article in the LA Times yesterday summing up the changing landscape of the Hollywood hotel scene has an interesting report on why Jason Pomeranc's Thompson Beverly Hills has been delayed. The reason is so crazy that we can't even bring ourselves to paraphrase it.
YOU expect the unexpected when you're opening a new hotel, but nothing
quite prepared Jason Pomeranc for the phone call he received as he rushed to get the doors open at the new Thompson Beverly Hills. "Did you read the newspaper?'" the caller asked Pomeranc, the co-owner of Manhattan-based Thompson Hotel Group. "There was a leftist guerrilla attack on the port in Colombia and our stone [a specially made black polished concrete intended for the hotel's lobby] is being held hostage by the guerrillas at the port."
Mmmmkay? Actually, there really was an a rebel attack on a Colombian port but the only shipment that the news reports talked about was cocaine.
Thompson Beverly Hills also offers a September opening date which again we don't believe. Simply because we drove by the spot yesterday and steel beams were just being erected on the rooftop for the hotel's ABH lounge. The rest of the place was still pretty much boarded up.
Then again, we hate always being so cynical about Thompson hotels. It's bad for our complexion. So we'll try to be positive about this. Maybe Pomeranc can free Beverly Hills from it's "beige prison" by the time the Emmys awards air. Just think of all the fabulous after parties the hotel can host!
This is a shot taken from the Crescent Drive and Wilshire Boulevard intersection of the Thompson Beverly Hills hotel which is set to open in July (so they say.) We snapped this pic the other night while cruising through Beverly Hills and yes, we know--we won't be winning any photography awards anytime soon.
We've also been by the hotel this week in the daytime and the entire place is still swathed in scaffolding except randomly, a garage in there.
Still July does not look feasible to us and a hotel industry insider said Thompson Beverly Hills won't open until September.
Meanwhile, the NYT took a look yesterday at what's been going on with Six Columbus. But even the Grey Lady can't get an answer from the Thompson Hotel peeps. For now, the "Summer" opening still stands. Rooms will start at $395 and the staffers will be staffed in rag & bone designer apparel.
Also, Jason Pomeranc's brother Larry makes an appearance, calling the place "funky but rich." Oh boy.
Close-up shot of Thompson Beverly Hills scaffolding after the jump.
We hear, straight from the Beverly Hills Conference and Visitors Bureau, that Thompson Beverly Hills is set for a July opening. This is not too surprising since Thompson Hotel peeps have been talking up a July opening as well.
Speaking of Young & Restless Manhattan Hoteliers, there's only 10 more days until Six Columbus supposedly opens but we thought we would give Jason Pomeranc a break from all that for now.
So we hit up his West Coast project, Thompson Beverly Hills.These pictures of Thompson Beverly Hills are encouraging. For one thing, the former Best Western has been shut down, finally. Two, construction has begun all over the building. Or at least scaffolding has been thrown up on every side of the building. Again, we say encouraging but we know Pomeranc usually falls apart when he's just a few months from opening.
However, maybe this picture of the gigantic Hotel Montage opening across the street will light a fire under Pomeranc's ass. The Montage is building from the ground-up and is predicting a Fall 2008 opening date.*
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by amandak
