Latest Articles on Pop Culture

Philippe Starck's surreal design, which the Hudson Hotel Bar showcases, makes you feel like you've gone down the rabbit hole.

Brand Wars: The World’s Hottest Hotel Designers

Last week, we introduced you to the wonderful world of Italian luxury bedding, and the sheet brands that hotels love to brag about. This week, we’re going to discuss the most important brand names a hotel can boast: the names of its interior designers. A famous designer can ensure a hotel’s hot-spot status, or establish…

Andree Putman, who designed the Morgans Hotel in 1984, also led the hotel's renovations in 2008. For the most part, she stuck to her minimalist guns, using lots of grays and beiges and mood lighting, plus a signature black-and-white checkerboard motif -- her nod to New York City taxicabs.

How Ian Schrager invented the boutique hotel

Small, heavily designed, and service-focused hotels existed long before Ian Schrager came along, but it took this American impresario to popularize the “boutique” hotel as a phenomenon — one associated with exclusivity, superstar designers and chefs, destination lobby-cum-lounges, and, above all, celebrity. Little wonder that Schrager famously started out in the nightclub business. He and…

Kelly Wearstler: From Playboy pin-up to Hollywood it-decorator

Unless you’re a design nerd, a Hollywood mogul, or a long-time reader of Playboy, chances are you’ve never heard of Kelly Wearstler, the centerfold model-cum-interior-designer behind hotels and homes from L.A. to Anguilla. If she’s not quite a household name, however, Wearstler has been getting a ton of mainstream exposure lately (sorry). Last year, the…