Waldorf Astoria New York Epitomizes
the Grand New York Experience

Synonymous with wealth, glamor, power and opulence, the name “Waldorf” has figured into tales of Manhattan for generations. In movies it has meant everything from a broken heart to a fortune made. For Americans of all stripes, it meant spending New Year’s Eve in front of the television watching Guy Lombardo and his Royal Canadians playing “Auld Lang Syne” from the hotel’s Starlight Roof.

One of the country’s more expensive overnights, the hotel properly called the Waldorf-Astoria is still a worthwhile Superior Stay for humble history lovers. Its story goes back to 1893 when the wealthy William Waldorf Astor opened his Waldorf Hotel on Fifth Avenue, attracting a monied clientele. William’s cousin, John Jacob Astor IV, opened a similar hotel right next door in 1897, drawing his well-to-do friends and associates. The two Astors linked their buildings with a corridor and the complex became known as the “Waldorf-Astoria.”

The owners had to give up the successful hotel enterprise in 1929; they’d sold the hotel’s high-priced Manhattan real estate to make way for the Empire State Building. Profits from the deal went into building the present Waldorf-Astoria. When it opened on October 1, 1931, to President Herbert Hoover’s words of congratulations broadcast on the radio, the 2,200-room hotel was the earth’s largest, filling in the block from 49th to 50th Street and stretching 42 floors above the pavement.

Commonly just called the “Waldorf,” the hotel wove its way into the social history of the 30s, 40s and 50s. Its staff claims it was the first hotel to introduce room service, to abolish the separate ladies entrance and to encourage frequent guests to make their suites permanent homes; the top 12 floors, called the Waldorf Towers, are made up entirely of residential suites. Some of the Towers’ residents have been President Herbert Hoover and five-star generals Dwight Eisenhower, Douglas MacArthur and Omar Bradley.

Be a part of Waldorf Astoria New York history... Stay here on your next stay to New York. You'll be glad you did.