The New York Post published a scathing article on the Plaza Hotel yesterday.
It’s a sad story.
The Plaza Hotel had been a landmark destination in New York. Drinks at the Oak Bar, oysters at the Oysters Bar, a quickie upstairs with a discreet woman. All that gone after three years of the Israeli group Elad purchasing the famed hotel. The Palm Court remains closed. The conversion of the downstairs kitchen into retail space prevented any operators from turning out the quality and volume of food necessary to pay the exorbitant rent charged by the owners. The subterranean ‘Retail Collection’ has shrunk store by store until only a handful of stores remain open.
In truth only one thing works in a abaasement and that’s a boiler.
The rest of the hotel is equally purgatorial. The Oak Room feeds the unaware and the Oak Bar serves drinks measured out in thimbles. The rest of the hotel feels like a set of THE SHINING remake. Tattered rugs and lonely hallways, but Elad claims that the hotel is on the verge of resuming its status as # 1 hotel in New York.
Only problem is that the Israeli owners are better at hostility than hospitality.
I know, because I worked in the Plaza Retail Collection for almost seven months.
A disaster from start to finish.
Luckily I made one big sale.
For $1 million.
So I was happy even in a bad situation.
I’m that kind of guy.
Pierre of the Plaza.