The Drake Hotel was a

hotel A hotel is an establishment that provides paid lodging on a short-term basis. Facilities provided inside a hotel room may range from a modest-quality mattress in a small room to large suites with bigger, higher-quality beds, a dresser, a re ...

at 440

Park Avenue Park Avenue is a wide New York City boulevard which carries north and southbound traffic in the boroughs of Manhattan and the Bronx. For most of the road's length in Manhattan, it runs parallel to Madison Avenue to the west and Lexington Av ...

and 56th Street, in Midtown Manhattan,

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

. Built in 1926 by

Bing & Bing Bing & Bing was one of the most important apartment real estate developers in New York City in the early 20th century. The firm was founded by Leo S. Bing (1874–1956) and his brother, Alexander M. Bing (1878–1959). The brothers often worked w ...

, it contained 495 rooms across 21 floors. It was sold in 2006 and demolished to make way for a residential skyscraper called

432 Park Avenue 432 Park Avenue is a residential skyscraper at 57th Street and Park Avenue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, overlooking Central Park. The tower was developed by CIM Group and Harry B. Macklowe and designed by Rafael Viñoly. A part o ...

History

The hotel was built in 1926 by the real estate organization of

. It was a 21-floor complex with 495 rooms. According to one source, "it boasted innovations such as automatic refrigeration as well as spacious, luxurious rooms and suites".

Fauchon Fauchon is a French gourmet food and delicatessen company that was founded in 1886 in Paris, France. Fauchon is considered a major reference in contemporary French gourmet foods, and it had 81 outlets in operation around the world as of 2019. ...

chocolates was located on the ground floor.

Notable residents

Silent film star Lillian Gish lived at the hotel from 1946 to 1949. Other notable guests included Frank Sinatra, Muhammad Ali,

Judy Garland Judy Garland (born Frances Ethel Gumm; June 10, 1922June 22, 1969) was an American actress and singer. While critically acclaimed for many different roles throughout her career, she is widely known for playing the part of Dorothy Gale in '' The ...

, Jimi Hendrix and

Glenn Gould Glenn Herbert Gould (; né Gold; September 25, 1932October 4, 1982) was a Canadian classical pianist. He was one of the most famous and celebrated pianists of the 20th century, and was renowned as an interpreter of the keyboard works of Johann ...

. Restaurateur

Toots Shor Bernard "Toots" Shor (May 6, 1903 – January 23, 1977) was best known as the proprietor of a legendary saloon and restaurant, Toots Shor's Restaurant, in Manhattan. He ran three establishments under that name, but his first – and most ren ...

lived there in his final years. Songwriter

Jerome Kern Jerome David Kern (January 27, 1885 – November 11, 1945) was an American composer of musical theatre and popular music. One of the most important American theatre composers of the early 20th century, he wrote more than 700 songs, used in ove ...

collapsed on the sidewalk in front of the Drake on November 5, 1945. In the 1960s and 1970s, the Drake Hotel was the preferred accommodation in New York for a number of touring

rock bands A musical ensemble, also known as a music group or musical group, is a group of people who perform instrumental and/or vocal music, with the ensemble typically known by a distinct name. Some music ensembles consist solely of instrumentalists, ...

, such as

Led Zeppelin Led Zeppelin were an English rock band formed in London in 1968. The group comprised vocalist Robert Plant, guitarist Jimmy Page, bassist/keyboardist John Paul Jones, and drummer John Bonham. With a heavy, guitar-driven sound, they are ci ...

and

The Who The Who are an English rock band formed in London in 1964. Their classic lineup consisted of lead singer Roger Daltrey, guitarist and singer Pete Townshend, bass guitarist and singer John Entwistle, and drummer Keith Moon. They are considered ...

. During their stay there in July 1973, Led Zeppelin had $203,000 in cash stolen from a safe deposit box at the hotel. The money was never recovered and the identity of the thief or thieves has never been discovered. The band later sued the Drake Hotel for the theft. The British rock band

Slade Slade are an English rock band formed in Wolverhampton in 1966. They rose to prominence during the glam rock era in the early 1970s, achieving 17 consecutive top 20 hits and six number ones on the UK Singles Chart. The ''British Hit Singles ...

stayed at the hotel on October 6, 1973 after their gig at the New York Academy of Music. Another British rock band

Sweet Sweetness is a basic taste most commonly perceived when eating foods rich in sugars. Sweet tastes are generally regarded as pleasurable. In addition to sugars like sucrose, many other chemical compounds are sweet, including aldehydes, ketone ...

made The Drake their home away from home during gruelling tours in the USA in the 1970s. In 1982, The Drake hotel accommodated singers

Karen Carpenter Karen Anne Carpenter (March 2, 1950 – February 4, 1983) was an American singer and drummer, who formed half of the sibling duo the Carpenters alongside her older brother Richard. With a distinctive three-octave contralto range, she was prais ...

and

Olivia Newton-John Dame Olivia Newton-John (26 September 1948 – 8 August 2022) was a British-Australian singer, actress and activist. She was a four-time Grammy Award winner whose music career included 15 top-ten singles, including 5 number-one singles on the ...

. Carpenter was a California resident who sought treatment for an eating disorder from Manhattan psychotherapist Steven Levenkron.

Venues

The Drake Room, opened in 1945, was the Drake's restaurant, presided over by Beniamino Schiavon ("Mr. Nino of the Drake") from its opening until 1968.

Cy Walter Cy Walter (September 16, 1915 – August 18, 1968) was an American café society pianist based in New York City for four decades. Dubbed the "Art Tatum of Park Avenue," he was praised for his extensive repertoire (with an emphasis on show tunes ...

played piano from its opening to 1951, and then from 1959 until at least 1966. The Drake's nightclub, Shepheard's, was touted as New York's first

discotheque A nightclub (music club, discothèque, disco club, or simply club) is an entertainment venue during nighttime comprising a dance floor, lightshow, and a stage for live music or a disc jockey (DJ) who plays recorded music. Nightclubs gene ...

and the most fashionable of the mid-1960s with celebrities like

Lee Radziwill Caroline Lee Bouvier ( ), later Canfield, Radziwiłł (), and Ross (March 3, 1933 – February 15, 2019), usually known as Princess Lee Radziwill, was an American socialite, public-relations executive, and interior decorator. She was the y ...

and

Julie Newmar Julie Newmar (born Julia Chalene Newmeyer, August 16, 1933) is an American actress, dancer, and singer, known for a variety of stage, screen, and television roles. She is also a writer, lingerie designer, and real-estate mogul. She won the Tony ...

dancing to a disc jockey until 3 a.m. seven days a week, despite its tiny dance floor. The club even had printed and distributed cards entitled, “How to Do the Newest Discotheque Dances at Shepheard's in New York's Drake Hotel” with step-by-step instructions to dance the Jerk, Watusi, Frug and the Monkey.

Demolition and redevelopment

The hotel was acquired in the early 1980s by the Swissotel company of Zurich, which renamed it Swissotel The Drake and undertook a $52 million room-by-room renovation of the building. The hotel received positive national exposure, as the syndicated

talk show A talk show (or chat show in British English) is a television programming or radio programming genre structured around the act of spontaneous conversation.Bernard M. Timberg, Robert J. Erler'' (2010Television Talk: A History of the TV Talk Sh ...

Donahue Donahue is the Americanized version of Irish surname Donohoe, which, in turn, is an Anglicized version of the ancient Irish name "Donnchadh" (sometimes "Donncha"). Donncha was a common “first name” in 9th Century Ireland, and when the use of ...

'' used the hotel to accommodate the show's guests, in exchange for a mention of it on each episode. Renovations were completed in 1991. In 2006 the hotel was sold for $440 million (equivalent to $ million in ) to developer

Harry Macklowe Harry B. Macklowe (born 1937) is an American real estate developer and investor based in New York City. Early life Macklowe was born to a Jewish family, the son of a garment executive from Westchester County, New York. He graduated from New Ro ...

. It was demolished in 2007, and the site became one of New York's most valuable development sites in 2011. In mid-2012, construction began on a residential skyscraper,

, on the site. Designed by

Rafael Viñoly Rafael Viñoly Beceiro (born 1944) is a Uruguayan architect. He is the principal of Rafael Viñoly Architects, which he founded in 1983. The firm has offices in New York City, Palo Alto, London, Manchester, Abu Dhabi, and Buenos Aires. Viñ ...

, the tower topped out in October 2014, becoming the tallest building in New York City by roof height, and the tallest residential building in the Western Hemisphere at the time of its completion.

References

External links