Mr & Mrs Smith have just returned from a stay at this Hollywood boutique hotel, and just as soon as they've unpacked their super-sized shades and iPhones, a full account of their luxury LA city break will be with you. In the meantime, just to whet your wanderlust, here's a peek inside Chateau Marmont in Los Angeles…
The hallowed status of Chateau Marmont is one backed up by a legion of starry stayers, and tales from behind its gates have become the stuff of Hollywood legend. Columbia Pictures founder Harry Cohn’s advice to his silver-screen protégées – ‘If you must get into trouble, do it at Chateau Marmont’ – is still taken as read by today’s A-list when they embark on a little R ’n’ R.
Perched on the hills above the hustle and bustle, this folly bourgeois has all the rambling corridors, vaulted colonnades and palm-fringed pools you’d expect of your average French chateau, and throws in a decent measure of mod cons and mid-century design to temper its original 1930s Arts and Crafts sensibilities. Its idiosyncratic pseudo-Norman architecture shines out across LA from high in the hills like a Disney castle gone bad; its turrets and towers a siren call to playboys and their perfectly coiffed muses. You all know the script – Led Zep roaring through the lobby on their Harleys; Jean Harlow bunking up with Clark Gable; Johnny Depp and Kate Moss romping in every room – why not write, direct and star in your own off-screen version?
Chateau Marmont may have a reputation for hard-partying, non-stop glamour, but the reason those in the know return time after time is simple: classic good looks that haven’t dated a jot, moreish menus by one of New York’s most feted new chefs, an intimate ambiance, and staff who know how to pamper without imposing. Truly, one of the classiest hotel acts around.
