There's tons of hotel news flying around this week and we don't have time to give each and every story the love and attention it may deserve, so you will have to settle for some news briefs.
· Spitzer and the Mayflower Return: As if it weren't bad enough that the former NY governor Eliot Spitzer cheated on his wife with a call girl in a DC hotel, he charged other stays at the hotel in early January 2008 to his campaign. [NY Times]
· Beijing Hotels Still Barren: Beijing is still having problems filling up for the Olympics. Bookings in hotels with three-star ratings or below were also under 50 percent, says the Beijing Tourism Bureau. [Sports Illustrated]
· Hottest Airport Hotels?: We're not used to hearing "Hot" and "Airport Hotel" in the same breath but Globorati found a five-star luxe airport hotel worth checking into. [Globorati]
· Bill Marriott Tries to Comfort Hotel Industry: Bill Marriott sends out a message on his blog about Marriott's recent earnings report, which were down by 24 percent from this time last year. [Marriot on the Move]
· NYLO Warwick Likes Furry Animals: NYLO Warwick when it opens in September will take your little dog too. The hotel says dogs and cats under 50-pounds are welcome. A $50.00 non-refundable fee will be charged to guests with pets upon check-in. Allergy sufferers, don't worry. Pets will not be allowed in the PURE allergy-friendly rooms. [NYLO Hotels]
A day before she was spotted taking the bus from NJ to NYC, Eliot Spitzer's call girl Ashley Dupre was frolicking on the beaches of the Jersey Shore.
Normally, this is nothing out of the ordinary for a Jersey Girl. However, we couldn't help but notice the towel that she was sitting on as seen in this pic from the Daily News.
Auberge Du Soleil, a chic resort in Napa Valley also favored by E from Entourage. While the hotel does sell many amenities online including bathrobes, you have to go to the hotel in person to pick up one of those towels yourself.
Corporate blogs are all the rage these days, presumably designed to let the corporate moo-vahs and shake-ahs communicate directly with adoring fans who want to know more. And in the hotel world, Bill Marriott, Chairman and CEO of Marriott International, has jumped onto the heap with his blog, Marriott on the Move.
While we are still convinced Bill is dictating his blog posts to a secretary, he does try to keep relevant. For instance, there's his take on immigration reform as it relates to the travel industry, and his post about the company initiative to teach employees Spanish. Of course, there's some questionable posts like his recommendation of "The Bucket List" but our fave is his latest.
Here, Bill talks about his chain's historic properties, including Chicago's Blackstone (with a wonderfully produced video covering the grand re-opening), and Dublin's Shelbourne.
He also has this to say about The Mayflower in Washington, DC:
The Mayflower hotel in Washington, D.C. was the site of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's inaugural ball back in the early 1930s. Also, J. Edgar Hoover used to have lunch at the Mayflower all during his tenure. Eleanor Roosevelt had afternoon tea there, and there have been many other famous people who have stayed there. What a lot of people don't know is that, in addition to being a famous hotel, the Mayflower is one of more than 140 Renaissance hotels around the world.
Mr. M conveniently omits the Mayflower's more recent notoriety -- it's the same hotel where Client 9, aka former New York State Luv Guv Eliot Spitzer, spent the night in room 871 conducting some unofficial gubernatorial hoo-hah.
Sure, it's not great PR for the chain, Bill, but it sure would make for awesome post fodder if you blogged about it.
Whew, the Renaissance Mayflower is having a bang-up year. First former NY governor Eliot Spitzer was revealed to have paid for a pricey session with a call girl in room 871 under the guise of Client No. 9.
Now, the hotel has suffered from a minor fire. A generator on the roof burned out early this morning causing the hotel to evacuate all guests for 30 minutes (at 4:30am, mind you) including the Irish prime minister, Bertie Ahern.
No injuries were reported and guests were allowed back in their rooms. This looks like the same thing that happened at the Gansevoort South the other week. Is 2008 the year of Hotel Fires?
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?
Whew, the 
There's a silver lining in the Eliot Spitzer-HookerGate after all.
