There are few strips in the world with a more competitive row of hotels than Sunset Boulevard, which undulates along the foot of the hills overlooking greater Los Angeles. Iconic spots like the Chateau Marmont, Sunset Tower, the Standard, and just a little further down, Beverly Hills Hotel, have all been made famous by films, television, and magazines. Other people swear by other properties along the way, including the Andaz, London, and Mondrian. Plus there's a brand new 1 Hotel, a Soho House, a handful of popular hotels just off the main drag, and a fancy Best Western. It’s crowded.
And now, throwing down the gauntlet is the just-opened The West Hollywood Edition, the latest in a flurry of hotels overseen by former Studio 54 impresario Ian Schrager. It is our newest selection for our series on exciting new hotels, The New Room with a View.
If you follow any influencer from the Los Angeles region, chances are that you saw lots of posts from the multiple opening parties the hotel threw to announce its arrival at the end of October and beginning of November. There has been nothing subtle about this property’s entrance into the West Hollywood hospitality lion’s den. While celebs could be seen throughout the party and later on social media, only time will tell if the hotel manages to keep them as regular customers to challenge the supremacy of other established spots.
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As for the hotel itself, however, they genuinely have done a fantastic job.
So long as you go in the right doors (the set to the left go to the Edition residences, which take up the top handful of floors), you enter a soaring yet chic lobby covered in Travertine marble. The building was designed by the minimalist British architect John Pawson. To the immediate right is the entrance to the hotel’s main restaurant, Ardor, from John Fraser. While the food served at the opening was delicious (Fraser is also behind the food at the Times Square Edition), it will be interesting to see if it pulls off becoming the see-and-be-seen spot like the Sunset Tower’s Tower Bar.
Just after Ardor on the right is the lobby bar, and then on through to the front desk. Past that is where on finds the spa and the hotel gym. One of my favorite thing about every Edition I have stayed at are the gyms. They’re fantastic, and this one lives up to that reputation, with dumbbells going up to 120 pounds. The gym is also where the spiral staircase that every Edition has is located.
The hotel boasts 190 rooms, 50 of which are one bedroom suites. The rooms are big and wonderfully appointed but a bit soulless (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing! In some ways the lack of statement in the rooms is a statement itself). Best of all, I stayed there on one of the opening night parties and went to bed long before it ended but didn’t hear any of it from the room.
But the most spectacular part of the hotel is undoubtedly its pool. Unlike a lot of the wading pools most other properties boast of, the Edition’s is a legitimate pool. It’s salt water and kept at 87 degrees. Coolest of all, in additional to unbroken views of Los Angeles (on a clear day) it sports a beautiful tree that gives it a bit of a modernist fairy tale vibe to it.
It’s hard to imagine how it’s possible with so many hotels having opened in the past couple years under the Edition umbrella that they could maintain high standards. Yet, with the new West Hollywood Edition, they clearly have.
