Living with Legends

     We’re constantly looking for ways in which Stanley Bard might improve service here at the Hotel Chelsea, and hopefully also make piles of dough for him to roll around in like Scrooge McDuck in his McMansion in the wilds of New Jersey.  A recent article in the New York Times suggests Guest Galleries and Megasuites, but I think we’ve already got the former, and as for the latter Stanley can just bust down a wall and throw out an artist or two when a yuppie needs to expand.
     But what’s really going to pack the tourists in are these new Peek-a-boo baths. The concept is simple: “At the Hotel on Rivington…the floor to ceiling windows allow neighbors on Delancy Street to spy into the shower.” And when you’re not busy displaying your own wares, the hotel supplies binoculars so you can size up the assets of others.
     Sheer Genius. The best ideas are always the simplest.  We’ve mentioned this trend before, and suggested that here at the Chelsea Hotel you can just climb up the airshaft and ogle Bohemian Booty to your hearts desire. What we can’t understand is why Stanley Bard has yet to advertise this amenity.
     But word is slowly starting to leak out.  A guy who has been staying here recently encountered a woman in the lobby:
    “…I know all about this place! I stayed here 15 years ago and I know all about the

     perverts in the walls! They would be on the balconies and the fire escapes when I was    

    changing’! They was filmin’ me in the shower, these fucking pervert tenants you got here!

    I know about the passage ways in the walls…and the peepholes!”
Sure as hell tops the Rivington! There are those among us – and I pity them—who would call this woman crazy.  I call her a visionary, in the truest, Madison Avenue, sense of the term.  Instead of throwing her out – which is apparently what happened to the woman the day in question – Stanley should hire her as his publicist.  Passage ways and peepholes! What semi-adventurous tourist could pass that up?  Peek-a-boo! (Ed Hamilton)