Check out Chris Shott’s article in today’s NY Observer wherein he poses the question: who would be foolhardy enough to take a job managing the Chelsea? Somebody who’s never heard of the damn place, that’s for sure. He trots out a list of the usual suspects, such as Schrager and Balasz, but I suspect they know too much about the situation to get involved. (Stay tuned to the blog, we’ll know soon enough.)
Speaking of clueless, Shott also helpfully directs us to Star Lounge owner Charles Ferri’s website, which features, of all things, a proposal for a café & bar in the Chelsea Hotel’s lobby! Does he think that that he’ll be allowed to just waltz in, la dee da, and start slinging cranberry cocktails? He apparently hasn’t been paying attention, either to the legal issues, or to the attitude of the residents.
Maybe he figures he can pay off Manny and get the El Quixote to forget their non-compete clause which bans other establishments from selling liquor in the building. He’s already said he doesn’t want residents in Star Lounge, and so I assume the same goes for the new lobby bar, but how are we supposed to avoid it?! (Note that Wifi is for “Café Members” only.) I guess we’ll have to tunnel out through the secret passageway to 22nd street –prodded along by the same helpful bouncers who already assaulted one of our number. Oh well–what me worry?–they already moved most of the comfy chairs out of the lobby anyway.
Another thing to consider is that, according to highly reliable sources, Ferri already owes a substantial amount of money to the hotel. If he can’t make enough to pay his rent on the Star Lounge, why on earth would minority shareholder Marlene Krauss want to give him the opportunity to owe more? Also, this idea of letting minority shareholder David Elder, his creditor, crash at his pad (and our sources tell us it was more than once) is also highly suspicious, and smacks of self-dealing on Elder’s part—exactly what he and Krauss self-righteously accused Stanley Bard of.
As for the name of the bar: no comment. Get an original thought, dude. Hey, is that a comment? I really thought I was going to be able to resist the urge. — Ed Hamilton
Living with Legends 
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