The Beverly Hills Hotel
Los Angeles, United States
The Pink Palace, where Hollywood has done its deal-making since 1912.
Before there was a Beverly Hills, there was the hotel, built in 1912 on a bean field with the town growing up around it. The Martin Brothers banana-leaf wallpaper, the pink stucco, the script logo: this is the look half of Los Angeles has spent a century copying.
The bungalows, scattered through the tropical gardens, are where the real legends played out, from Marilyn and Garbo to the Taylor-Burton dramas. They're still the thing to book, private and hushed and thick with ghosts.
The Verdict
As a working luxury hotel it has newer, sharper rivals across town. As a piece of living Hollywood mythology it has no competition at all. Come for the poolside and the Polo Lounge, not the thread count.
A Cobb salad in a green-leather booth at the Polo Lounge, watching an agent and a director pretend they aren't making a deal three tables over.
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