Self-consciously hip hotel designer Andre Balazs, (rhymes with mirage, persiflage) appears to be having cash flow problems. How else to explain his decision to unload half of his hotel portfolio, including New York’s QT Hotel and the Standard Hotels in Los Angeles, Hollywood, and Miami? (I guess he knows no one would want to buy the gargantuan blunder that is the Standard on the Highline 
where, I believe, BD Hotels may also be involved.) The explanation that he wants to focus on the hotel management business doesn’t hold water, as management and ownership certainly aren’t mutually exclusive. The only other possible explanation is that he’s seeking to dump these duds because he believes the market has topped-out. In which case Caveat Emperor, to say the least.
In other hipper-than-thou news, we’ve received tips to the effect that one or more young designers have checked into the Chelsea to begin the clandestine redesign of various hotel rooms. Reportedly, this use of novice, no name designers is one of the hallmarks of the Balazs approach to hotel renovation, as it makes it easier to take credit for their work. (Note to the young designers: If you’re really hip, tell Balazs and BD where they can stick it. It’s uncool to mess up a landmark of the counter-culture such as the Chelsea.) –Ed Hamilton
Living with Legends
Hotel Chelsea Blog
16 responses to “Balazs Barrage: Dig This, Gone Cats”
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Does Andre Balasz actually have anything to do with the Chelsea? Or is that just rumor?
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Andre Balazs originally came in guns blazing with those idiots from BD Hotels (and was quoted as so in the Independent) but when the press got bad (and the bad press hasn’t even really begun for these losers) Balazs stuck his tail between his legs and ran away. Guess now he realized the bad press wasn’t going to help him get out of his financial problems.
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God, these guys are pathetic — they can’t even afford to keep their own properties, but then they come in here and try to take Stanley and David’s? What jerks. Sounds like it’s just a matter of time before the bank forecloses on the BD farm — after all, aren’t they just Andre Balazs’ poor relations?
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management and ownership certainly ARE mutually exclusive! that is the entire point of management contracts. Four Seasons only owns 4 (i think) of their 74 hotels world wide. all the big chains such as marriott and hilton have been selling off their real estate for the past 10 years in order to focus on management, they have only held on to properties that have serious value (such as their new york properties) That is where funds such as blackstone come in, they own the hotel and the management company runs it for them.
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I’ve noticed them doing construction on the weekends at that creepy building over on the High Line. I hope they’re running out of money over there too.
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If management and ownership ARE mutually exclusive (or one precludes the other, i.e. the definition of mutually exclusive) then why has Balazs been doing both? And why therefore is BD Hotels (i.e. owners) now managing the Chelsea, which, mutually exclusive or not, is the only property manage. (If one can call their hit parade staff of brain dead twelve year olds managers).
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I was doing some research on BD recently, as far as i can tell they have only sold one hotel in like 20 years, and no signs of impending bankruptcy or foreclosure. what makes you think that they are in trouble? i cant find any of their properties on the market (and i spoke to like 100 brokers) and the one property that they are involved with balaze, the mercer, is like the only one he isnt selling.
so what makes you think that banks are knocking on BDs door?
as far as balaze and the chelsea go, i think that is just a rumor, has anyone seen him around the building since that one time he came by when BD first came in?LikeLike
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so if new york properties have such serious value, why is balazs selling the QT? these guys are obviously hemmorhaging money pretty seriously.
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dear bd researcher, why don’t you investigate the projects bd couldn’t capitalize, like the private residence club at the standard? even with andre balazs and charles blaichman as partners they had to pull the plug on the whole project after they couldn’t raise a measly $6 million stopgap in private equity to secure more than $77 million in bank financing. these people are leveraged to the hilt – check their investment offerings – the deals are almost entirely bank financed and the recent departure of the banking world’s ceos in the past few weeks is BAD news for them and their ilk. balazs is just stepping up early to try to get ahead of a very scary bullet.
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Dear BD investigator: one reason Balazs may not be selling the Mercer is precisely BECAUSE of his partnership with BD — the Crain’s article makes that pretty specific, i.e. that it would be harder for a single investor to purchase his equity in those partnerships. Which must be painful for Balazs as word on the street said his work with BD there was PAINFUL for him — he told friends he thought they were stupid vulgarians.
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Yes yes — notice he says he may seek to “refinance” his positions in those partnerships, i.e. the BD ones. Translation: sinking ships, get money out before a run on the bank.
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Stanley, buy out these losers. Somehow. They’ve tampered with sacred ground. Only bad things can come to them because of it. Worse than a thousand gypsy curses, it is.
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jwsus, how i loved New York, but she beat me like a red-headed stepchild every day. I, too, lusted for living in the Chelsea but couldn’t afford it, so I lived in the Albert on 11th Street, which is now condos. NY, the one I loved, always belonged to artists and outlaws, until Giuliani killed it years ago. So why blog now?
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Oh God – I lived at the Albert too! 1964. Worked as a waitress at Barney Josephson’s The Cookery and before that at a crazy club on McDougal Street. I learned to make instant coffee from tap water at the Albert-a “director-producer” said “if I remember correctly the water at the Albert is very hot” it was! And I loaned my room to a guy who turned out to be a peeping Tom! I think I paid 17.00 a week for my room. I come from a small town in Canada and one night there was so much moaning and groaning in the next room that I called the desk thinking some poor woman was being beat up!
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Thr blog no because Stanley tried to keep the spirit of the place intact through all times, seasons and managed to do it, by the skin of its teeth, until this June, when the Barbarians breached the gates.
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The Albert and the Chelsea were owned by the same people–the Knott family–before the Bards came along. Significant?
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