In the new year, the Ritz-Carlton Huntington Hotel & Spa will get a new name and new owners. Starting January 8th, the hotel will be referred to as the Langham, Huntington Hotel & Spa.
The Pasadena hotel will become part of Langham Hotels International, a luxury hotel group owned by Hong Kong-based Great Eagle Holdings, a Ritz-Carlton spokesman said today.
Staff members of the 392-room hotel were meeting today to discuss the transition, which is expected to have minimal immediate effect on guests, said Vivian Deuschl, vice president of public relations for Ritz-Carlton Hotel Co.
Indeed Langham Hotels, while a smaller chain (only 8 properties), has a few luxury properties under its belt, namely the Hong Kong hotel with its sushi turndown.
This hotel used to be owned by the Los Angeles County Employees Retirement Assn. but when staffers complained of working them too hard, we guess they dumped the property. Let's hope Langham treats the staffers with more respect.
Listen up Brides-to-Be and Invited Guests: Throughout the summer, we will be featuring all types of hotel wedding stories from packages to honeymoon suites to hotel wedding heaven and hell.
Whether you are getting married, planning your wedding, or just taking advantage of someone's open bar reception, we want to hear your hotel wedding tips/stories/frustrations. Send your hotel wedding stories and questions here.
Caveat nuptialists! Dispatches from the wedding-industrial complex confirm that finding the right wedding planner involves serious vetting and careful consideration. An article in yesterday's Sunday Styles section of The New York Times recounts several very close calls wedding-planning couples had with consultants and hotels.
It's not quite clear how to take Michelle Higgins' recent New York Times review of the Ritz Carlton Huntington Hotel & Spa in Pasadena. Though she does make one point clear, the Ritz is actively making attempts to keep up with the hip boutique hotel scene. Along with its classy rep and digs, this Ritz locale which dates back to 1907 has added little trendy updates but still falls short in places, namely: service.
An internet station in the business center will soon come with a charge since it's been poorly manned and thus caused some serious lines. And that's just the beginning of the service problems during Higgins' short stay.
When we got the munchies around midnight, however, our chicken quesadilla never arrived. When we called room service, about 45 minutes later, to check on it, an employee apologized and said they had sent it to the wrong room. By that time we were too tired to eat and so declined the offer of a new order.
Yet Higgins' finishes her review by stating that "the high-quality Ritz service is still largely intact." The question is then, where? There certainly aren't any examples of this tip-top service in the review.
For a room starting at $399 and a name like Ritz, we'd expect more in the service department. Let's hope they don't think this is the new cool boutique attitude they're looking to adopt along with their more modern style.
We never would have thought that Hallmark Channel, the creator of all things warm and fuzzy and starring Kellie Martin, would be responsible for breathing new life into Penguin Gate.
The first Penguin Gate happened back in 2005 when P.Diddy and the folks at Hotel Victor in South Beach decided having a couple of scared-looking penguins stand in the middle of a hotel party would be cool, much to the dismay of PETA.
A TV critic for the SF Chronicle had this to say about the penguins:
What I did find out was that THE PENGUINS HAD A ROOM ACROSS THE HALL FROM ME. Damn dirty penguins. I knew it...They were the stars of the party. They came down a blue carpet. Yes, they really did. I was late, so I don't know if Morgan Freeman actually introduced them as planned.
Later I met the penguins. There were only two of them. They were cute, and small - surprisingly small, as if you could club the life out of them with a Wiffle bat. Not that I would even think of such a thing, but they were definitely small. Like actors. They certainly looked bigger up on the screen when I slept through "March of the Penguins." But my point is this - I tracked them down and I asked the keeper a question: "Did these penguins have a room at the hotel?" She looked stunned. "Uh, yes." I stared back. "What number?" She looked blank. "First floor, 100s maybe?" I asked. Then she lit up. "Yes, room 110." Ha! J'accuse!
We knew Ritz Carlton had a pet-friendly policy but apparently this now includes penguins. Putting penguins up at the Ritz might cause PETA to look the other way on this one but the only thing the Hallmark Channel forgot was to pay Tara Reid a couple grand to show up and throw up.
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by juliana
