Years ago when I was in-house counsel for an oil company my favorite hotel to stay in when in Paris was the understated yet opulent and glamorous Plaza Athénée located 25 Avenue Montaigne (other hotels we sometimes stayed at were the George V and the neighboring Prince de Gaulle). I was told by a senior partner of a Parisian law firm that the Plaza Athénée was where old European money stayed and at the time among the shops in the lobby were Harry Winston and Bulgari boutiques. Wikipedia reports that famous guests who have stayed at the Plaza Athénée over the years include Mata Hari (who was arrested here), Josephine Baker, Rudolph Valentino, Grace Kelly, Jean Harlow, Gary Cooper, and Jackie Kennedy.
My glory days of traveling like the very wealthy ended when I left the oil company and moved back to Virginia from Texas, but years ago, the Plaza Athénée opened a branch in New York City, the Plaza Athenee - New York which captures much of the the magnificence and elegance of its larger sister in Paris. And now, the Plaza Athenee-New York is marketing wedding packages to the LGBT market. The image above is from the March issue of Out Magazine (it appears following page 44) and shows that savvy businesses and retailers recognize the viability of the LGBT market despite the nay saying and threatened boycotts by gay-hating Christofascist groups such as AFA.
I am glad that New York State and the folks at Plaza Athenee - New York believe in marriage equality. Now that my brother has an apartment in New York, we may not stay at the hotel, but we will certainly stop by for a drink or more.
One of the ironies of Virginia's anti-gay extremism is that the state - which includes tourism as one of its biggest industries - is losing huge amounts of money from the LGBT market. Why visit a state where one is clearly not welcomed or deemed equal. And compounding the problem is the flow of money from LGBT Virginians who leave the state to marry(many of our friends have married in New York and Washington, DC) and vacation. As noted many times on this blog, bigotry does have a high price.
The photos below are of the wonderful hotel in Paris:
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| Front Facade |
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| Lobby |
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| Patio Courtyard |
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