The Plaza Hotel

The Plaza Hotel at 5th Avenue and Central Park South in New York was re-opened last Saturday, after a three-year, $400 million renovation. It is now jointly owned by a Saudi Arabia company. The minimum price for a room in the hotel is now $1,000 per night. The original cost of the building was $12 million. When it was first opened in 1907 it was described as the greatest hotel in the world. For the hotel there was placed the largest single order in history for gold encrusted china. 1650 crystal chandeliers were purchased. Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Vanderbilt were registered as the first residents.
The hotel has special significance to me because a number of years ago when I took my two daughters to visit my niece Kelly and her husband Jay Tunney in New York, The Plaza Hotel was our meeting place. Jay told me that his father Gene Tunney, former heavyweight boxing champion of the world, used to meet friends at the Bar in the Oak Room of the hotel. I gazed in awe at that Oak Room and in the main waiting area, containing all of those crystal chandeliers.