[HN Gopher] The Chelsea Hotel Becomes a New York Battleground
___________________________________________________________________
The Chelsea Hotel Becomes a New York Battleground
Author : lermontov
Score : 34 points
Date : 2021-07-05 02:56 UTC (20 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.nytimes.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.nytimes.com)
| jb1991 wrote:
| https://web.archive.org/web/20210705030230/https://www.nytim...
| neonate wrote:
| https://archive.md/DyqsA
| gbronner wrote:
| Two words: rent control. The long term tenants have leases that
| will be very valuable if the hotel recovers. Owners can't kick
| them out, but have no real desire to appease them, as they pay
| almost nothing.
| neuro wrote:
| It's entertaining to watch these ritzy tenants play jane
| bluecolors with their frequent and public complimentary lap
| dances from the new york times.
| kmos17 wrote:
| ritzy tenants lol, you've obviously never been inside the
| Chelsea or met its actual tenants.
| neuro wrote:
| I have insider knowledge of the hotel and its tenants. The
| Chelsea tenants are firmly wealthier beyond the American
| middle class.
| aaronchall wrote:
| That's not hard to believe.
| jjulius wrote:
| >I have insider knowledge of the hotel and its tenants.
|
| Perhaps you would care to elaborate, then, rather than
| simply being snarky?
| petsormeat wrote:
| Patti Smith's memoir "Just Kids" has terrific detail about daily
| life in the Chelsea Hotel in the 1960s-70s.
| sweetcheeks69 wrote:
| I'm honored to have been exposed to some of the hotel's history
| and its famous tenants through a relative who was part of the
| scene in the 90s. Truly an iconic place!
| spunker540 wrote:
| This is largely irrelevant, but Leonard Cohen's song "Chelsea
| Hotel #2" is the primary reason I find the hotel special. Every
| time I walk past the song pops in my head. I'd be excited to see
| the hotel returned to some glory, bohemian or not. It's been
| under scaffolding for most of a decade it seems.
| saalweachter wrote:
| One of the things I think is special about NYC is the degree to
| which its physical places have become a part of the wider
| American culture.
|
| From Central Park to the 59th Street Bridge to the Empire State
| Building to Macy's, I probably knew more places in New York
| when I first moved there than I could name in my own home-town.
| Part of that is the relative sizes, but New York has a cultural
| footprint beyond other large cities like Chicago or LA.
| mcspiff wrote:
| Being on the top of the Empire State Building with my uncle
| who absolutely loves NYC and having him just point out so
| much famous stuff is a great memory. Just history as far as
| the eye can see.
| jjeaff wrote:
| Which is saying a lot considering how much larger the film
| industry is in Los Angeles. A huge percentage of films are
| done in southern California and even written into the script
| as taking place there. And yet the iconography and history of
| New York city is just so rich that it still pervades a lot of
| pop culture.
| unklefolk wrote:
| I'm confused. The article talks about "tenants". Does this mean
| the Chelsea Hotel is not actually a hotel, as it has long term
| tenants?
| jw1224 wrote:
| The Chelsea Hotel is usually best known for having housed many
| famous figures over the years:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotel_Chelsea#Notable_resident...
| david_allison wrote:
| The Chelsea used to be an artist's cooperative, it was a mix of
| long-term and short-term residents, and was infamous for being
| lax with rent payments, with many living there rent-free.
|
| This medium article gives a good perspective of its past.
|
| https://medium.com/@bagelboy/make-america-bohemian-again-de8...
| raldi wrote:
| The word comes from the French _hotel,_ which just means hall.
| Historically, many "hotels" were places that housed medium-to-
| long-term guests, either exclusively or alongside short-term
| visitors. Like the Eloise books, which took place at the Plaza
| Hotel, or Paris's Hotel des Invalides, where wounded soldiers
| recovered.
| bsanr2 wrote:
| IIRC hotel and hospital have the same roots, which makes the
| term "hospitality" much less confusing.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| The article covers this pretty clearly, describing decades-long
| tenants and saying:
|
| > Plans are underway to make the Chelsea Hotel an actual hotel
| again.
| [deleted]
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2021-07-05 23:01 UTC)