The winter social season in Gilded Age New York, which lasted from October until Easter, was a whirlwind of frantic activity that included dinner parties, luncheons, receptions, opera performances, and, of course, balls. The single most important event of the season was indisputably Mrs. Astor’s annual ball, which always took place on a Monday in…
Tag: Astors
The Waldorf-Astoria: hyphenated hotel and a family scandal
Most family scandals don’t result in hotel construction. However, the famed Waldorf-Astoria owes its existence to the Astor family quarrel. The Astor fortune was divided between two branches of the Astor family headed by the two grandsons of the dynasty founder – John Jacob Astor III and William Backhouse Astor, Jr. Each of them had…
The St. Regis or What do Napoleon, Dalí and Marilyn Monroe have in common?
Architects: Trowbridge and Livingston Built: 1904 Although there is seemingly nothing in common between Napoleon Buonaparte and the 17th-century French monk named Francis Regis, these names strangely come together in the story of the St. Regis Hotel in New York. Built in 1904 by John Jacob Astor IV as the most opulent hotel in the world, it…