The Pierre Hotel
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Pierre Hotel is a 41-story luxury hotel located on Fifth Avenue and 61st Street, facing Central Park, New York City. It is owned by the Taj Hotels Group, which owns and manages luxury hotels and resorts around the world.
The hotel consists of 201 rooms, 40 suites, and 12 grand suites. Among the 80 residents are Viacom entertainment company chairman Sumner Redstone, Harrods owner Mohamed al-Fayed, and designer Yves Saint Laurent. The penthouse is an easily-recognizable skyscraper landmark, modeled after Mansart's Royal Chapel at Versailles, a system of Corinthian pilasters and arch-headed windows, with octagonal ends, under a tall slanted roof that is pierced with bronze-finished bull's eye dormers.
Designed by the New York firm of Schultze and Weaver as a skyscraper that rises in a blond brick shaft from a limestone-fronted Louis XVI base, the Pierre opened in 1930 under the management of Charles Pierre Casalasco. After suffering from bankruptcy, it subsequently passed through a series of owners, finally ending up under the management of the Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts in 1981.
The Pierre has been owned by a housing cooperative (co-op) since 1959. There are 76 co-op owners of the Pierre, 30 of which live permanently among the 201 guest rooms in the hotel.
A triplex co-op that occupies the top three floors was placed on the market in 2003, with a pricetag of $70 million [1]. This 11,000 square-foot apartment features five bedrooms, four terraces, a paneled library, wine cellar, a black marble staircase and the hotel's former ballroom with 23-foot high ceilings. It was originally purchased by hedge-fund manager Martin Zweig, from publishing heiress Lady Mary Fairfax in 1999 for $21.5 million. With its $70 million pricetag payable in full at purchase, the co-op is currently listed in Forbes Magazine as the eighth-most expensive home in the world [2], fourth-most expensive home in the United States[3], and second-most expensive home in the Northeastern United States in 2006.[4].
