The New York Times | September 20, 1984

DESIGN IDEAS IN 2 NEW SMALL HOTELS

By Suzanne Slesin

Steve Rubell of Studio 54 and Andrée Putman, the Parisian interior designer, were scurrying through the nearly completed renovation of the building that will house Morgans, a 154-room hotel that will open Oct. 1 at 237 Madison Avenue, between 37th and 38th Streets.

"We tried to build it like a home," said Mr. Rubell, who is a partner with and Philip Pilevsky, a New York City developer, in the venture.

Morgans, on the site that the Executive Hotel once occupied, takes its name from the Morgan Library nearby. Along with the Hotel Plaza Athénée, it epitomizes a growing trend in the city: the development of smaller, quieter hotels that provide the requisite niceties meant to appeal to a sophisticated international clientele.

Uptown at 37 East 64th Street, at the Hotel Plaza Athénée, a 160-room Trust-house Forte endeavor that replaces the defunct Hotel Alrae, crystal chandeliers were polished and marble floors got a final buffing in time for the opening this Monday.

Although similar in concept to Morgans, it has a totally different look and atmosphere. Whereas Morgans projects an understated simplicity and up to the minute style, the Plaza AthÈnÈe is more traditional, relying on the tried and true symbols of opulence: marble, flowers and Louis XVI furniture. Morgans' prices range from $75 a day for a single room to $190 for the largest suite. At the Plaza AthÈnÈe, the first branch of the Paris hotel, rooms will range from $150 for a single to $1,500 for a two bedroom suite. Those who are familiar with Mrs. Putman's interior design work will recognize many of her trademarks at Morgans, including a neutral palette in the dÈcor. The challenge was to enliven the building's small, low ceilinged rooms; Mrs. Putman's very contemporary design, low-key and thoughtfully detailed, creates a restful and comfortable atmosphere is spite of the rather small rooms.

"The idea was to be unpretentious and discreet and to look like anything except a commercial hotel room," Mrs. Putman said. For the designer, that meant keeping the color scheme to her signature black and white with a few modulated shades of gray, adding a touch of pale melon and dusty turquoise here and there.

Mrs. Putman also commissioned the artist Robert Mapplethorpe to create a series of black and white photographs for the rooms. The small details that provide convenience are neatly incorporated into the overall scheme: There are wall niches to keep phones out of sight and close at hand, blackout shades on the windows, small snack filled refrigerators, black ice buckets that will be refilled every evening, silver television sets and black toothbrushes. There are also black and white checkered combs, white towels and bathrobes, banquettes with lift-up seats in which luggage can be stowed out of sight, small tables on casters for dining and custom designed stained bird's eye maple built-ins for storage. Lighting fixtures, designed by Paul Morantz in collaboration with Mrs. Putman, are adjustable for reading in bed.

The treatment of the bed, always important in a hotel room, is unusual. At Morgans, there are no bedspreads. Instead, the beds have duvets that, like the sheets and pillowcases, are made of Brooks Brothers cotton shirting material, and headboards slipcovered with gray cotton pillowcaselike covers that will be changed after each guest. Easy chairs are covered in a men's wear gray flannel or pinstriped fabric.

But Mrs. Putman's tour de force is the design of the minuscule bathrooms. There are two types. One has walls covered is a checkerboard pattern of matte black and white tiles; the other, all white matte tile walls enlivened with a checkerboard tile frieze. Round stainless steel sinks on slim legs, elegant oval mirrors, thick glass shelves and floor-to-ceiling glass shower doors complete the design. Richard Reif was the production architect for the Morgans project.