Thread by @esotouric

There was a big shindig at the Barclay today, celebrating a new direction for the oldest continuously operated hotel in LA. Healthy Housing Foundation thinks SRO #DTLA hotels should be affordable housing, not boutiques. We do, too! esotouric.com/hotelbarclay/

We were giddy to see this new addition to the Barclay's lobby furniture: a chess set, in honor of Raymond Chandler's detective Philip Marlowe, who found a man with an ice pick in his neck, upstairs in room 332, in "The Little Sister." One day we'll sit and play a game.

How else to welcome a Victorian residency hotel back into service than with Christmas songs from a troupe of time travelers? Beneath the "VN" stained glass window bearing first owner Isaac Newton Van Nuys' seahorse crest, they warbled sweetly.

Our preservation pal Nathan Marsak was there to celebrate the return of the Hotel Barclay to honorable trade as affordable housing, and cuddle up with a ice creature in a corner of the lobby. No, Nathan, you can't landmark him!

These lovely, hard-boiled characters manifested around the Philip Marlowe memorial chess set in the Barclay lobby, reminding us of all the trouble and mystery the oldest continuously operating hotel in Los Angeles has seen since opening in early 1897 as the Van Nuys.

Upstairs, 158 mostly vacant rent controlled residency hotel rooms are being quickly updated to provide safe, dignified and affordable housing to Angelenos who need it. The cost to fix the Barclay up is reasonable, in contrast to projects where politicians' pals skim off the top.

On display in the Hotel Barclay is a plaque for Healthy Housing Foundation's dedication of the empty building as safe, affordable housing for those in need. Reader, we cried a little. This is so pure, so needed. Los Angeles HAS lots of housing if you just open your eyes and look.

Who is that cracking the original Mosler double door safe which has been sealed for as long as anybody can remember? Why, it's Charlie Santore, master of impossible locks. theatlantic.com/technology/arc…

So what was in the safe? Just stray scraps of paper, bank deposit slips, IOUs and hotel stationery, all about 90 years old. Safecracker Charlie Santore says it's always that way, locked safes never have treasure inside, but how we'd hoped for a Hotel Van Nuys desk register!

Nathan Marsak demonstrates the interior mechanism of the 1890s Mosler safe that safecracker Charlie Santore opened up during the dedication of the Hotel Barclay as the newest addition to the Healthy Housing Foundation's affordable portfolio. So satisfying! instagram.com/p/CX0JEEOss-X/

Press release: AHF Rededicates L.A.’s Barclay Hotel as Low-Income Housing LA’s Oldest Hotel Brings Hope for the Holidays. businesswire.com/news/home/2021…