The renowned Taj Mahal Hotel. ©1991 UrbisMedia
Among the city’s diverse land uses perhaps none provide the diversity of functions as do its hotels. At various times and places hotels have served as palaces, brothels, hospitals, statehouses, the temporary or permanent abodes of sinners and saints, the renowned, and anonymous, as places of love, licit and otherwise, as sites of mayhem and merriment.
Hotels are often our first impression of a new city, in how they welcome us and soothe the weariness of travel. They become a surrogate home, a place where we are known (or at least recognized) in cities full of strangers, offering privacy, sustenance, and entertainment. The best of them will cater to virtually every pleasure or need, from a massage to a business center, to print from your laptop, and of course, a place where one can have a “private lingerie show” in their room.
Many hotels are so much mingled with the histories of their cities that one often evokes the other. We need not have been a guest at the Dorchester, the Ritz in Paris, or some other grand establishment to remember that a famous author set his story in a hotel (A Room With A View); that another was once the palace of a ruler of the city (The Danieli); that another was the location for a renowned film (The Del Coronado); or that dozens of famous personalities took rooms at The Winter Palace in Luxor in the 1920s from which to launch their visit to the newly discovered tomb of Tutankhamen.
The following is a score of hotels whose repute is well-connected with their city. Match the hotel with their city.
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©2004, ©2015, James A. Clapp (UrbisMedia Ltd. Pub. 1.1.2004)