‘You’re the top! You’re a Waldorf salad’ Cole Porter, 1934

This is the intriguing story of two iconic New York hotels and the creators,

designers, and celebrities who met, feasted and lived there. Few realise that the

glamorous art deco Waldorf-Astoria hotel on Park Avenue, New York ‘home in New

York to the stars’, had an equally iconic predecessor, the old Waldorf-Astoria on Fifth

Avenue at 34th Street, where liveried footmen wore eighteenth century style

breeches.

Built in the 1890s by the feuding Astor cousins at the height of the Gilded Age, in its

day, the old Waldorf-Astoria on Fifth Avenue had been the place to meet and be

seen, where high society paraded in the latest Parisian fashions in Peacock Alley.

Business tycoons, entrepreneurs and acquisitive art collectors such as J P Morgan

and Henry Clay Frick met there to ‘do deals’ - finance or art. In 1929 in true New

York style, it was sold and torn down to make way for the Empire State building.

Moving uptown and reflecting the relentless climb up the social grid of Manhattan,

the glamorous new Waldorf-Astoria on Park Avenue was built at the height of the

Depression and was famous before it opened. At Christmas and New Year, the

world tuned into the celebrations from the famous Starlight Room with its roof open

to the skies. Its glittering ‘Jazz Age’ interiors were created by leading European

designers, artists and sculptors. Celebrity guests included Winston Churchill, John F

Kennedy, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, Cole Porter, and Frank Sinatra, Greta

Garbo and Howard Hughes. This lecture recreates the stunning interiors of both

hotels and the personalities who created and enjoyed them