La Fonda finishes renovations

LaFonda Hotel

The historic La Fonda Hotel in Santa Fe, N.M., recently finished extensive renovations and showed off the results with a ceremonial ribbon-cutting and open house Tuesday, according to the Sante Fe New Mexican newspaper.

Upgraded furnishings, windows and color motifs, as well as improvements to the landmark hotel’s rooftop bar were on display, along with changes to a suite where such celebrities as Zsa Zsa Gabor and husband Conrad Hilton once stayed.

That suite was reduced in size to add extra balcony space and a kitchen for the adjoining Bell Tower Bar.

The Albuquerque Journal posted a more detailed look at the work done:

Architect Barbara Felix rescued and restored original cast iron chandeliers from storage to brighten the lobby. The old twin Crayola-bright headboards have been cleaned (some were reproduced) and paired to anchor king-sized beds.

Cowboy hats painted by Native American artists embellish the corner of a winding staircase leading from the lobby to the second floor. La Fonda board chairwoman Jennifer Kimball bought the headgear from the Southwestern Association for Indian Arts. Brightly colored teepees circle one brim; another sports cowboys and horses; a fractured Picasso-meets-pueblo portrait design engulfs another. The works echo the aesthetic choices of the building’s 1922 architect, Mary Jane Colter. […]

Tin work and painted glass bring a Spanish Colonial aspect in the hotel lamps, light fixtures and framed door numbers. Workers cleaned old mirrors, pounding out bumps and soldering broken corners.

The bathroom tile is a mix of 1920s subway style with honeycombed floors.

Workers ripped out old carpeting in the rooms to reveal the original 1929 colored concrete floors dating to the Mary Jane Colter-John Gaw Meem era. Where the concrete was irreparable, they installed wood.

The hotel never closed, but the renovations took about 8 1/2 months. Bradbury Stamm Inc. of Albuquerque was the contractor, and it aimed to bring the hotel closer to the look Colter envisioned.

(Photo of a remodeled guest room courtesy of La Fonda)

 

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