With 'Edition,' Marriott Goes Boutique
Michael S. Rosenwald, Washington Post, 1/29/2008
Bill Marriott and Ian Schrager, two of the unlikeliest business partners in lodging history, finally have a name for their new boutique hotel chain: Edition.
The announcement of the name, scheduled for today in Los Angeles, comes seven months after the pair revealed their partnership on the roof club of Schrager's eclectic Gramercy Park Hotel in New York, and nearly 10 years after Marriott International rival Starwood launched its boutique W Hotel concept to much fanfare.
Marriott said in an interview that the name took several months to work out and ultimately emerged from Schrager's team, which is not surprising given that the 75-year-old chief executive has said his Bethesda -based company didn't have the creative chops to enter the boutique space on its own.
"I like the name," Marriott said. "You can use it as the new Edition or the 14th Street Edition or the Wall Street Edition. Anything you want to put in front of it ties in with the name."
Schrager, the proprietor of the Studio 54 nightclub who later became the creative godfather of boutique hotels, said Edition clicked because of the idea behind the entire project -- that each hotel, while similar in sophistication and atmosphere, would be designed to fit in with the local surroundings and culture.
"Each city, each location will be its own separate edition," Schrager said.
Schrager and Marriott are to also announce today the first nine locations for what both parties hope will eventually be a collection of more than 100 Editions. The first Edition is to open around 2010 in Paris, followed shortly after by South Beach in Miami.
The District will get an Edition in the 18th Street corridor, though no details on timetable or location were available. There will be two Editions in Los Angeles -- one in Hollywood, the other potentially at the $2.5 billion L.A. Live project, where there are also plans for two other high-end Marriott properties. Chicago is on the list, as are Scottsdale, Ariz.; Costa Rica; and Madrid.
Marriott's entry into the boutique business comes after some of its rivals are already established in the space. But the company has sometimes sought to sit on the sidelines and watch what others do first, then come in and dominate by sheer scale and pinpoint execution.
Boutiques are important for Marriott because they create a younger buzz than traditional business or leisure travel do. The hotels also have high room rates and rake in good money spent on fancy meals, drinks and entertainment.
The designs for Edition are still in the preliminary phases, but Marriott said the hotels will "look like they were invented by Ian Schrager and not by Bill Marriott, and that's why we got him." Marriott and his company have been known, for the most part, for classic design. Schrager's Gramercy Park Hotel is described on its Web site as "Bohemia reinvented for the 21st century."
The combination of two such differing sensibilities brings to mind a question that many in the hotel world have been asking for months: Just how are Bill Marriott and Ian Schrager getting along?
Schrager admits, "On the surface we may not look the same." Marriott is a devout Mormon, a spinner of Glenn Miller tunes and an old-fashioned gentleman. Schrager is none of those things. On the balconies of his Studio 54 nightclub, people did more than just drink. He can be volatile. He spent time in prison for tax evasion.
Marriott said: "It's been fine. He's been very cooperative, very thoughtful."
And Schrager said: "Everyone said this would be the partnership from hell, that we would never get along. But my DNA is similar to Bill Marriott's. He's a perfectionist. He loves what he does. He wants to be involved with something really special."
And they need each other. With Schrager, Marriott gets not only a burst of creativity but also credibility in the boutique hotel market. With Marriott, Schrager gets scale and the opportunity to take his creative powers around the world.
"The pundits will be proven wrong," Schrager said.