The Hotel Chelsea (also known as the Chelsea Hotel and the Chelsea) is a hotel at 222 West 23rd Street in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. Built between 1883 and 1884, the hotel was designed by Philip Hubert in a style described variously as Queen Anne Revival and Victorian Gothic. The 12-story Chelsea, originally a housing cooperative, has been the home of numerous writers, musicians, artists, and entertainers, some of whom still lived there in the 21st century. , most of the Chelsea is a luxury hotel. The building is a New York City designated landmark and on the National Register of Historic Places.
The front facade of the Hotel Chelsea is 11 stories high, while the rear of the hotel rises 12 stories. The facade is divided vertically into five sections and is made of brick, with some flower-ornamented iron balconies; the hotel is capped by a high mansard roof. The Hotel Chelsea has thick load-bearing walls made of masonry, as well as wrought iron floor beams and large, column-free spaces. When the hotel opened, the ground floor was divided into an entrance hall, four storefronts, and a restaurant; this has been rearranged over the years, with a bar and the El Quijote restaurant occupying part of the ground floor. The Chelsea was among the first buildings in the city with duplex and penthouse apartments, and there is also a rooftop terrace. The hotel originally had no more than 100 apartments; it was subdivided into 400 units during the 20th century and has 155 units as of 2022.
The idea for the Chelsea arose after Hubert & Pirsson had developed several housing cooperatives in New York City. Developed by the Chelsea Association, the structure quickly attracted authors and artists after opening. Several factors, including financial hardships and tenant relocations, prompted the Chelsea's conversion into an apartment hotel in 1905. Knott Hotels took over the hotel in 1921 and managed it until about 1942, when David Bard bought it out of bankruptcy. Julius Krauss and Joseph Gross joined Bard as owners in 1947. After David Bard died in 1964, his son Stanley operated it for 43 years, forming close relationships with many tenants. The hotel underwent numerous minor changes in the late 20th century after falling into a state of disrepair. The Krauss and Gross families took over the hotel in 2007 and were involved in numerous tenant disputes before the Chelsea closed for a major renovation in 2011. The hotel changed ownership twice in the 2010s before BD Hotels took over in 2016, and the Chelsea reopened in 2022.
The Chelsea has become known for its many notable guests. Residents have included Mark Twain, Dylan Thomas, Arthur Miller, Bob Dylan, Edie Sedgwick, Janis Joplin, Leonard Cohen, Arthur C. Clarke, Patti Smith, Robert Mapplethorpe, Miloš Forman, and Virgil Thomson. The Chelsea received much commentary for the creative culture that Bard helped create within the hotel. Critics also appraised the hotel's interior—which was reputed for its uncleanliness in the mid- and late 20th century—and the quality of the hotel rooms themselves. The Chelsea has been the setting or inspiration for many works of popular media, and it has been used as an event venue and filming location.
Site
The Hotel Chelsea is at 222 West 23rd Street in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. It stands on the south side of the street, between Eighth Avenue and Seventh Avenue.
The hotel was developed on a site created by combining seven land lots. The store and the land had belonged to James Ingersoll, who was associated with the Tammany Hall political ring in the 1870s. of the firm of Hubert, Pirrson & Company. The style has been described variously as Queen Anne Revival, Victorian Gothic, or a mixture of the two. It was one of the first Victorian Gothic buildings to be erected in New York City. At the time of its completion, it was the city's tallest apartment building at approximately tall. According to the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission, the Chelsea's design was evocative of the demolished Spanish Flats on Central Park South. and is divided vertically into 25 bays. It is grouped into five sections, with projecting pavilions at the western end, center, and eastern end of the facade. These pavilions flank two groups of recessed bays. and another plaque mentioning that the building is on the National Register of Historic Places.
On the upper floors, the brick is interspersed with white stone bands. The hotel has flower-ornamented iron balconies on its second through eighth stories, These balconies were intended as "light balconies, after the Paris fashion"; according to author Sherill Tippins, the balconies were meant to "add charm to the lower floors". The center of the roof was interspersed with hip roofs, beneath which were duplex apartments; residents of these duplexes had direct access to the roof.
The basement measured up to deep and housed the kitchen, laundry, refrigerators, coal rooms, engines, and machinery for gas-powered and electric light.
Public areas
When the hotel opened in 1884, the ground floor was divided into an entrance hall, four storefronts, and a restaurant for tenants who did not have their own kitchen. The lobby was originally furnished with a marble floor and mahogany wainscoting. On the left wall of the lobby was an elaborate fireplace mantel, These rooms had decorations such as stained glass, carved gargoyles, and fleurs-de-lis. Next to the lobby was a manager's office, whose ceiling had gold trimmings and a mural with clouds and angels. as well as a restaurant, cafe, laundry room, billiards room, bakery, fish-and-meat shop, and grocery on the ground floor and basement. The lobby contains furniture in various colors, while the front desk is clad with purple marble. In addition, various paintings by residents are hung on the beige-pink walls, and the lobby's ceiling is decorated with frescoes, roses, and garlands. Adjacent to the lobby is the Lobby Bar, which contains mosaic-tile floors, a marble bar, art from former residents, and old chandeliers. This bar, formerly storage space, has several pieces of mid-century modern furniture which has occupied the hotel since 1955. The restaurant is decorated with a marble terrazzo floor, a rough-hewn ceiling, Among the decorations are a series of murals depicting scenes from the book Don Quixote, as well as oil paintings. the Dulcinea and Cervantes rooms at the rear comprised nearly half of the restaurant's seating capacity. located within three rooms. The bistro includes vintage decorations, some taken from the Lord & Taylor Building.
thumb|Art fills the staircase of the Hotel Chelsea.
Also at ground level is a mom-and-pop store named Chelsea Guitars and a private event space known as the Bard Room. The main staircase, at the center of the hotel, is illuminated by a rooftop skylight The walls of the staircase were once lined with photos created by residents. The staircase originally had iron railings and marble treads. There was also an elevator cage, decorated with rosettes that matched the exterior decorations. Above the ground floor, there were originally either 90, or 100 apartments in total. Each floor had a mixture of small and large apartments, so residents of different socioeconomic classes could reside on the same story. Sources disagree on whether the largest apartments had eight, and many units also had servants' bedrooms. These apartments were arranged as duplexes, with artists' studios on the upper level and bedrooms on the lower level, This was reduced by the 2000s to about 240 or 250 units (some with multiple rooms).
Following a renovation that was completed in 2022, some decorative features, such as entry halls and doorknobs, were redesigned with monograms containing the hotel's name.
History
During the early 19th century, apartment developments in the city were generally associated with the working class, but by the late 19th century, apartments were also becoming desirable among the middle and upper classes. Between 1880 and 1885, more than ninety apartment buildings were developed in the city. The architect Philip Hubert and his partner James W. Pirrson had created a "Hubert Home Club" in 1880 for the Rembrandt, a six-story building on 57th Street that had been built as housing for artists. Hubert believed that such clubs could help entice middle- and upper-class New Yorkers to live in apartment buildings. The structure, later known as the Chelsea Hotel, was originally known as the Chelsea Association Building and was to be developed by the Chelsea Association. It is unknown who specifically devised the idea for the building. In August 1883, the Chelsea Association obtained a $200,000 mortgage loan for the building () from the Equitable Life Assurance Society. The same bank placed a $300,000 mortgage loan on the hotel that December (). By March 1884, the Chelsea Association Building was nearly complete. One account in The New York Times described the Chelsea as "the most profitable and popular of [Hubert and Pirsson's] enterprises". Two-thirds of the original apartments were owned by Chelsea Association stockholders, and the other third were rented out. Almost from the outset, the Chelsea was one of the most popular of Hubert's Home Clubs, and there were more prospective tenants than available apartments. The Chelsea was located in what was then the center of New York City's theater district, with venues such as the Booth's Theatre and the Grand Opera House nearby. According to the Real Estate Record and Guide, many construction suppliers and workers moved into the apartments rather than accept monetary compensation. These residents largely moved from other apartment buildings. Other early residents included painter Rufus Fairchild Zogbaum, During the 1890s, many of the Chelsea Association's original stockholders either died, moved away, or had become involved in legal and financial controversies. By the 1900s, the Chelsea was accepting a larger number of short-term visitors. In the first two decades of the 20th century, the hotel hosted events such a merchandise sales; meetings of local groups, like the Chelsea Society of New York and Syracuse University Club of New York; and educational lectures. Following the sinking of the RMS Titanic in 1912, several guests from the Titanic were also given rooms at the hotel. The managers sometimes removed guests' corpses from the hotel. One of the ground-level stores was leased to the Greater Engineering Company in 1920.
Knott operation
Knott Hotels, a family-owned firm that operated numerous budget hotels in New York City, leased the hotel in March 1921, establishing the 222 West Twenty-third Street Hotel Corporation to operate the Chelsea. The lease initially ran until 1942. By then, half of the Chelsea Association's original stockholders remained, and many parts of the hotel needed to be repaired or upgraded. Shortly after taking over, the Knotts split up some of the apartments, added a reception desk at the bottom of the Chelsea's grand staircase, closed the dining room, and added kitchenettes to existing apartments. In addition, the hotel's American floor numbering system was changed to a European floor numbering system; for instance, the second story, directly above ground level, was renumbered as floor 1. The Hotel Carteret was erected to the east in 1927, blocking eastward views from the Chelsea. By the end of the 1920s, the Chelsea had been further subdivided into more than 300 rooms. The Knotts had replaced the lobby's paintings with wallpaper, and they had moved the original lobby furniture to make way for a heater on a banquette. Most of the hotel's bellhops and waiters were African-American by this time. Switchboard operators and desk clerks called residents by their nicknames. The Asbury Park Press called the Chelsea one of the "last ornate landmarks of a Little Old New York locality".
Batchelder's Restaurant leased the Chelsea's restaurant space in early 1930. During that decade, the Chelsea Hotel remained popular among artists and writers because of the low rents, the friendly atmosphere, and the fact that the residences provided large amounts of privacy. Because many of the old apartments had been subdivided, each floor had various winding corridors leading to the different rooms. The low rents in particular attracted artists like John Sloan and Edgar Lee Masters. There was controversy in late 1934 when then-manager Jerry Gagin commissioned a series of satirical paintings from John McKiernan, depicting three politicians.