Over lunch at Brasserie 44 last week, Fred Kleisner, CEO of Morgans Hotel Group, pledged to encourage his nearly 6,000 employees at the Royalton, Hudson and other boutique properties around the country to vote on election day.

"In a very nonpartisan way," insisted Mr. Kleisner, who was, nonetheless, proudly sporting his "Obama '08" bracelet.

He even promised to compensate workers for their time spent at the polls.

Sure enough, on Monday afternoon, Mr. Kleisner followed through with a seemingly unbiased e-mail directive to supervisors:  read more »

So much for the hotel boom.

The AP is reporting that shares of hospitality companies are tanking amid a gloomy outlook for travel in 2009.

New York-based companies Morgans Hotel Group and Starwood Hotel & Resorts were among those with the steepest declines during the Dow's overall 777-point freefall on Monday:

Starwood shares dropped $3.39, or 11.2 percent, to $26.88 in afternoon trading, after touching a 5-year low of $25.95 earlier in the session. Morgans Hotel shares lost $1.61, or 12.9 percent, to $10.83.

How will the financial crisis impact the city's ever-higher tourism projections? Will less demand for rooms trigger a drop in skyrocketing hotel rates?

Stay tuned.

Eccentric designer Philippe Starck apparently doesn't think much of the Royalton Hotel's new look.

“I think if you are lucky enough to own an icon, you shouldn’t kill the icon," Mr. Starck said of the hotel lobby's recent redesign, during an interview with the New York Times.

Mr. Starck, of course, created the Royalton lobby's prior look for hotelier Ian Schrager in 1988, featuring "chair legs shaped like ram’s horns" and "a Champagne bar that conjured up the inside of a genie’s bottle," as the Times put it.

In its heyday, the Starck-designed lobby and restaurant 44 offered a fashionable hangout for media people and celebrities, and some credit the Starck-Schrager partnership at the Royalton with pioneering the whole boutique-hotel craze.

Restaurateur John McDonald, who spearheaded the recent lobby redesign alongside architects Roman & Williams, previously explained his rationale for the total lobby overhaul in an interview with The Observer.  read more »