When André Balazs – then a successful biotech entrepreneur and New York night-club impresario with a burgeoning interest in the hospitality business – bought the Chateau Marmont back in 1990, his friend, the fashion photographer Helmut Newton, asked him to come to his room at the hotel.
What Helmut wanted was an assurance that whatever André did with his new property, he would not change a thing. This was despite the fact that the hotel, at the time of André’s acquisition, was up for demolition and rich only in the historical (for Los Angeles) sense. Helmut and his wife June used to spend six months a year there and liked it just as it was. André recalls, ‘Helmut said, “Whatever you do, don’t fuck it up,” and, as he leans back on the sofa, it rips. The spring comes out.’ The photographer was unfazed. In a place like LA, where visual perfection is often the goal, seediness sometimes counts as character. And this town loves characters.
First conceived as an opulent apartment complex in what was then an undeveloped and unpoliced stretch of West Hollywood, the Chateau opened right before the Great Depression, when luxury apartments in bad neighbourhoods were not exactly in demand. The property changed hands and, in 1931, was turned into a hotel, which became known more for its discretion than its amenities. It was a place to which, for decades, those with boldfaced names went to misbehave surrounded by mismatched furniture, tucked away above Sunset Boulevard. A still-married Humphrey Bogart hid out with his young co-star (and future fourth wife) Lauren Bacall; Bette Davis nearly burned the place down when she fell asleep with a lit cigarette; a young Warren Beatty tried to skip out on his bill; Led Zeppelin drummer John Bonham drove a motorcycle through the halls; Jim Morrison swung from balcony to balcony and from bed to bed; John Belushi overdosed and died there.
Over the years, the ownership changed, but the rooms rarely did. Guests kept coming anyway. And then André bought it and began the work of stoking its louche appeal and mythology, while transforming it into a proper luxury hotel, where everything was clean and in good working order – the kind of place he would actually bring his friends to stay in, where ashtrays and matches await on end tables and yet none of the rooms smell of cigarettes. It just could not be so transformed that Helmut would not recognise it. ‘The trick was how to make it better without him noticing,’ André notes. ‘Every year, he’d come back and say, “André, I don’t know how the place looks so good and you haven’t touched anything.”’ This was when every suite and courtyard tile had been upgraded.
That is the key to the continued success of Hollywood’s most enigmatic and iconic hotel, says André, ‘It’s about how to make it better all the time, without anyone noticing what you’ve done.’ Some 34 years later, André sits atop a small empire of hospitality’s coolest, most celebrity-friendly properties, including London’s Chiltern Firehouse. And with the global pandemic now in the rear view, he is busy considering the Chateau’s nips and tucks to come.
The usual renovations of a 63-room property built in the late 1920s are taking place, sure, but you would have to know what to look for. The additions are not solely superficial either. André has organised a speaker series – Chat Chats – with writer Angela Janklow, which kicked off with artist Ed Ruscha. ‘It won’t be boring – not a TED Talk, but interesting people sharing ideas.’
André wants to encourage gatherings of the kind of people who have always flocked here and made it their de facto clubhouse. The Chateau has been beloved by creatives for as long as it has been a hotel; it is the kind of place where you can check in and feel immediately part of the bohemian glamour. It is the first choice for many Hollywood see-and-be-seen events for brands and for talent – historically, it is where Beyoncé and Jay-Z have held their Oscars party. But there will also be someone you have never heard of in the lobby hard at work on their novel, while the most famous person you have ever seen eats a burger on a banquette, hiding out in plain sight. ‘I think the Chateau stands out, for what Los Angeles is and for what Los Angeles isn’t,’ says André.
He likes artists and his hotels have always welcomed them as both guests and collaborators, whether that has meant allowing them the freedom and space to create or to stage an impromptu exhibition of their work, as photographer Annie Leibovitz has done, pinning up portraits she took at the property in the halls with push pins. The tent that covers the hotel’s courtyard needs to be replaced and André is talking to the Paris-based Shibari artist Marie Sauvage about rigging the rope-covered poles that secure it. Though typically known for trussing up comely nudes, she seemed game, he says, and suggested she stage a performance there. You would not see that at a Four Seasons hotel.
The Chateau is that rare thing – a property that has maintained its mystique the more famous it has become. Despite its mid-century-spare suites and panoramic balconies being nearly as familiar a backdrop as the Hollywood sign, it retains an air of exclusivity and never feels overdone or overexposed. At the time of writing, Gucci and Celine were running advertising campaigns that had been shot there. When Sofia Coppola set her 2010 film Somewhere at the Chateau, it was as much a character as its stars Stephen Dorff and Elle Fanning. Miley Cyrus has been giving informal performances in the lobby, whenever she feels like it.
‘I think it’s such an important part of Hollywood now and what’s left is to make it better,’ says André. ‘Though better sounds like something needs to be changed…’ What he means instead is a kind of gentle growth, a gradual evolution. ‘The way that a writer gets better, or a musician. You are still the same person – you just get better and better.’ And still, somehow, you do not look as if you have aged a day. This is Hollywood, after all.
Rooms at Chateau Marmont cost from $639: chateaumarmont.com
