Inside The W Hotel’s Glamorous Hollywood Glow-Up

If you buy an independently reviewed services or products by a hyperlink on our web site, The Hollywood Reporter could obtain an affiliate fee.

In 2010 in Hollywood, Robert Downey Jr. was the most important field workplace draw, Avatar broke information and Katy Perry dominated the charts with Teenage Dream. The solar set on The Hills, the Walking Dead zombies awakened and Lady Gaga wore the meat gown.

In a supporting function, the W Hollywood Hotel made its debut that January on the crossroads of Hollywood and Vine, near the Walk of Fame, the Pantages Theatre and the Capitol Records Tower. It would quickly function the setting for a lot of occasions, premieres, purple carpets, launches and zeitgeisty rooftop events that made the gossip pages.

There weren’t many respected resorts in Hollywood correct at the moment. Chateau Marmont, the Beverly Hills Hotel, Sunset Tower and others have been miles away. But W Hollywood’s grand red-carpeted staircase, sunken-in Living Room, leather-based dice couches and cascading waterfall chandelier — so aughts! — grew to become a brand new central assembly level between town’s east and west corridors.

In the 15 years since W Hollywood opened, the encircling neighborhood has undergone a radical transformation: much less light glamour, extra buzzy eating places and resorts equivalent to Mother Wolf, Bar Lis, Ka’teen and Hollywood Volume.

Two years in the past, in an effort to adapt to its altering setting, W Hollywood started a major transformation with Rockwell Group on the helm. Inside the Living Room (don’t name it a “lobby,” at the least not when you work for the model), the inside palette now options calming greens, yellow and blues with undulating velvet seating; a celestial mirrored art work acts because the room’s centerpiece; and a rounded staircase and a dialog pit promote connections amongst friends. The columns within the Living Room modified from sq. to round. The bar has been relocated, with retractable glass partitions that open onto the backyard. A lighting set up faces the grand hearth, framed by 35-foot-tall, 3D-printed concrete drapes. There are also two new eating choices: the “modern Angeleno” There There for dinner (suppose milk bread, tiradito and deviled eggs) and The Patio inside The Garden for all-day eating.

“This hotel contextualizes Hollywood and is a meeting place of all different kinds of spaces — there’s a sense that you’re arriving at a secret garden,” says designer David Rockwell, who additionally creates units for Broadway reveals, together with Art, starring James Corden, Neil Patrick Harris and Bobby Cannavale, opening later this 12 months. “When you think of Hollywood and that surrounding area, you think of homes tucked away behind hedges. We wanted that anticipation, that sense of discovery, and that this place is both indoors and outdoors. We looked at creating cinematic light. The majority of the entertaining happens in these beautiful private homes [in the Hollywood Hills] and so we wanted to create multiple seating areas.”

Above the social areas, the 319 spacious rooms and suites have all been up to date with twenty first century performance, maximizing work, rest and leisure. Curved seating areas, outsized window seats and customized lighting fixtures forged a radiant glow. The 12 suites, every with separate residing areas, eating areas, built-in moist bars and his-and-hers closets, appeal to high-profile bookings. Notable are the Oasis suite, that includes outside seating for 50, and the Mega suite, with an outside residing space and library lounge with billiards.

The former pool membership, WET Deck, options dawn and sundown bars. The nightclub is now the Loft, providing panoramic views of Los Angeles. It is the primary resort with a 3D spatial sound system by Tempo that creates an immersive soundscape tailor-made to every particular person. In an indication of the occasions, the previous ground-floor VIP lounge is now the fitness center.

Rockwell isn’t new to W. In 1998, Starwood Hotels and Resorts visionary Barry Sternlicht commissioned the designer to assist him create the primary W Hotel in New York City. Often cited because the mission that launched the boutique way of life resort motion, the unique W Hotel modified the sport. The military of employees dressed not in fits however in black T-shirts, and buzzwords like “experiences” and “programming” entered the branding lexicon.

Starwood offered to Marriott in 2016, and Rockwell went on to design many different W Hotels nationwide, together with in Union Square. Now Rockwell is overhauling that resort as properly, following the instance of the newly redone W Hollywood — which kicked off a wave of transformations all through the U.S.

“Our birthplace is New York,” says George Fleck, senior vp and world model chief at W Hotels. “And Los Angeles and Hollywood, being the epicenter of entertainment, is a critical part of our DNA. We needed our hotels in these two cities to be showplaces.”

The four-year transformation of the W New York — Union Square was just lately accomplished. Other properties which have undergone renovations embrace W Austin, W Dallas, W Hoboken and W Nashville. New resorts embrace W Budapest, W Sydney, W Prague and W Punta Cana.

Says Fleck, “We expect that by 2029, 90 percent of our U.S. portfolio will be transformed.”

This story appeared within the Aug. 13 situation of The Hollywood Reporter journal. Click here to subscribe.