Santa Monica's whimsical Palihouse brings old-school glamour to tech's hippest neighbourhood
“This is nothing like California,” I overheard one of the staff members say to a guest at Palihouse, the Spanish Colonial Revival mansion-turned-boutique beach hotel that opened last year in Santa Monica in the US.
By California, I assume he meant modern, glass-clad, bright and filled with celebrities looking to be recognised. It certainly isn’t that. Instead, this version of Palihouse, as opposed to its more urban sibling in West Hollywood, harks back to an older version of LA glamour, with its 1927 Mediterranean architecture, wrought-iron grillwork, terra-cotta tiles, dark teal and forest green walls, wing chairs and velvet couches. You’d almost expect to see Humphrey Bogart having a smoke in the corner.
At one point, J Paul Getty owned the mansion; at another time, it was the Embassy Hotel Apartments, the reason there is still a sign reading ‘Embassy’ at its Washington and 3rd Street corner, confusing first-time arrivals. During the era of cross-country railroads, it was the hotel at the train’s last stop—with a small effort of imagination, you can still feel the echoes of ambitious actors from the ’40s and ’50s discussing that day’s auditions in the courtyard.
(This story appears in the July-Aug 2015 issue of ForbesLife India. To visit our Archives, click here.)