Jill Hutchinson's Reviews > The Plaza: The Secret Life of America's Most Famous Hotel

The iconic Plaza Hotel sits on the most prime piece of real estate in NYC........5th Avenue and 59th Street, overlooking Central Park and has prevailed for 112 years, through good times and bad. It was THE place to be seen and some of the very rich lived there year round and were pampered to a fault by the management and staff. Beautifully designed, it was the ultimate in luxury and a magnet for the rich and famous.

The author took 11 years to complete the research for this in-depth study of the life of the Plaza, talking with guests, residents, and staff, some of whom had been at the hotel for 50 years. The stories they told were fascinating and sometimes rather poignant. The Plaza thrived thought the Gilded Age and the Roaring Twenties and was the setting for some of F.Scott Fitzgerald's stories. With the Great Depression, business faltered and the owner of the Plaza, Harry S. Black, committed suicide after losing his fortune in the stock market crash. And so began the changes of ownership which have plagued the Plaza through present times. First, famous hotelier, Conrad Hilton bought it, then the Westin Hotel chain, then Donald Trump who drove it into bankruptcy, and then the billionaires of the UAE juggled it among themselves and currently is owned by the Qatar Investment Authority.

It is not the same Plaza of memory as it now houses luxury condominiums, a boutique hotel, and retail stores. Preservationists did succeed in having it placed on the Historic Register and parts of the hotel still remain the same as the first day, in 1907, when Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt became the first guest to sign the register. This is an interesting and well written history and is recommended.