51 - A Christmas Gift ... or the little red lamp 

Mother and Daddy at the Fairmont Hotel, San Francisco

     As it is the yuletide season, I will indulge myself in sharing a non-hotel Christmas memory.

     When I was about eight, my aunt Frances had given me five dollars for my birthday in September of which I had saved some for a Christmas present for my mother.

Snaggletoothed in 1950

     At the time, there were two dime stores in Aberdeen.  Mack's was the oldest and most popular, officially called a "5 - 10 and 15-cent store," and it was there that I went looking for a gift.  

     Mack's was an excellent store to buy candy, dish towels, can openers, baseball cards, and any number of other useful things.   As Aunt Frances (who was a particularly conservative interior decorator) would have been the first to tell me, it was not the best place to find a tasteful gift for the home.   

     I was confident I had found the perfect Christmas present there, a little red lamp.  I mean all red.  Red glass "hurricane" globe, red imitation-crystal droplets, red base.  It cost $1.29, it was my own money,  and I was thrilled with the beauty of my purchase.

Mother

  Come Christmas morning when I brought out my prize find, I was proud to see Mother's absolute delight with the magnificent gift.  

The lamp and her reaction became instant family folklore.   She explained with great enthusiasm that it  was so special, that she was going to wrap it up and put it away safely in the attic as soon as Christmas was over, and then bring it down every year for the holidays.

      Which she did.  

     I don't know what ultimately happened to my little red lamp, but I do remember it was still out in its prime spot, surrounded by holly and mistletoe, when I returned home in 1997 for what was to be Mother's last Christmas.   
 

 The parents quite a few years later

Another Paris Christmas!

Here are a few hotels decked out for the holidays.

(Hotels are Parisian unless otherwise indicated)

Hotel Raphael --Clark Gable slept here!

The Four Season George V courtyard

 Some creative reindeer at the George V

    

 

 The Hotel Prince de Galles

The Negresco's original aquatic Christmas tree, Nice

Sumptuous courtyard at the ex-Intercontinental, now the Hotel Westin
 (Eugenie, the last Empress of France, wife of Napoleon III, resided here in her declining years)

Teddy bear tree at the brand new Hotel Montaigne

All white at The Meurice (Salvador Dali lived here).

Polar bear at the Lancaster

Courtyard (above) and main lobby (below) of  Hotel Bristol,

 scene of Woody Allen's "Midnight in Paris." 

Looking back at the Biltmore Millenium, Los Angeles 2011

Montmartre

 

 MERRY CHRISTMAS ! 

Your input is welcomed. Click here to send email:  hotel-musings@hotmail.fr

  [Photos are mine, unless otherwise credited]

CROSS REFERENCING … a look at other postings

"Mother" was also featured in blog No. 46 "Grandmother Vivian, Doc and the Others" and No. 49  "Thanksgiving: Ruth and Dickie ... and more about Mother"; Aunt Frances was featured in blog No. 4 "A Two-Dollar Hamburger Under a Silvery Dome" and blog No. 61"Goodbye Rose"   (to access, click on highlighted titles).

50 - The Plaza Athenée on the auction block

THE PLAZA ATHENEE, Paris

Everything for sale, from the chandeliers to the pillowcases

The Plaza Athenée has just joined a line of famous Parisian hotels to shut down for an unlimited duration in order to rebuild and renovate and redecorate from head to foot.  Before completely closing its doors, the Plaza A. announced it would put everything (or just about) up for auction.

  Brenda and I were there bright and early for the first day’s viewing.  No special idea of buying anything, just another aspect of my hobby to be explored.  It was fun having the run of the place, exploring the backstairs and looking through some of the suites throughout the hotel.

In addition to the more predictable chairs and sofas and beds and tables and flowerpots, there was an unexpected concièrge’s letter box, several sleek red hotel bicycles and a few shiny chrome toilet paper dispensers awaiting the highest bidder.

We have had occasional contact with the hotel’s Relais Plaza Grill, and I was interested in seeing some of the things I knew well from that restaurant.  I had long admired a couple of very special art-déco-style vases which stood in the vestibule leading to the grill room. 

Favorite vase, it was not meant to be!

If we could have acquired just one of them, that might have made an extra special memento.   On closer examination, however, the degree of Hollywood-style make believe became increasingly obvious.  

Seen as a whole, everything blends together into a superbly chic creation which in turn becomes the personality of a grand hotel.  However, taken as individual items, the faux semblant is everywhere.  Everything is imitation, much like décors in a theatre or on a Hollywood backlot. 

When we enquired about the black and white vases we had fancied, we were a bit taken aback to discover they were in fact incorporated into the large sideboard they had adorned, so they couldn’t be removed … or stolen!  If we had really wanted the vase, we would have had to purchase the massive piece of furniture onto which it was permanently attached.  

Waiting for the doors to open the day of the sale

For the auction sale, itself, only the grandest address would do.  Although the pre-sale exhibit was conducted at the hotel, the sale was entrusted to the Artcurial auctioneers who have their sale rooms in a sumptuous 19^th century private mansion at the foot of the Champs-Elysées.  Visiting the auction house was even more glamorous than was strolling through the hotel.

  I liked the idea of acquiring a momento of the Plaza A., and of the multitude of things to go under the hammer, many of the pre-sale estimates were low.  Experience has taught me, however, you can never count on where auction prices might go.  In the case of a grand hotel sale, just about everything is a copy of something else.  That is, furniture and bric-a-brac are all of style-Louis XVI or style art-déco or style art-nouveau, but nothing is its own original contemporary era.  As a consequence, there is little intrinsic value to anything, all estimates take into account that the interest of potential buyers is generally sentimental and often one of passion.  So prices go where they go, and that can be sky high.

The auction house was almost more elegant than the hotel

This was indeed the case.  We had spotted a handsome statuette of a 1920’s style horse, which we had long admired in the restaurant’s entryway.  It was evaluated at 400 euros (which was already more than one would have generally thought of paying).  We got a little carried away, pooled our resources, and thought maybe about pushing it to 550 euros. 

Alas, the stylized, silvered bronze horse (which measured 13 inches high) sold for almost 4,500 dollars, plus another thousand in auction fees!  Needless to say, not to us! 

The last we'll ever see of our little horse!

Your input is welcomed:  hotel-musings@hotmail.fr

[Photos are mine, unless otherwise credited]

CROSS REFERENCING … a look at other postings

The Plaza Athenee was also featured in blog No. 33, "Breakfasts in the 1970's," and No. 44, "The Best and the Worst," and No. 45, "End of the Season Au Revoir"  (to access, click on above titles).