Issue link: http://papercitymagazine.uberflip.com/i/1525827
Billy Fong checks in and checks out the hottest hotel in New Orleans. I hate being the last to a party. You know, the dreaded last person to discover something. For the past two years, I've heard about Hotel Saint Vincent in New Orleans — and not in the jaded "been there, done that" tone. Instead, the vibe was: "Been there, and I can't wait to go back. It's where all the cool kids stay while in New Orleans." I was intrigued. Why haven't I been there already? I made a reservation while planning a road trip to visit my father in Tallahassee; New Orleans is the perfect midway spot between Dallas and the Florida capital. First impression: Even the website is chic, the home page a collage of vintage black-and- white photos of what I assumed was the main building, layered with wallpaper you'd find in a historic home, but not overly antiquish and cluttered. Mixed-in images of nuns and floral touches left me intrigued. Any trip to the Big Easy has to include cocktail time with girl about town Jane Scott Hodges. I suggested lunch at Hotel Saint Vincent. We met at her gorgeous Leontine Linens repository on Magazine Street for her heritage linens, then made our way to San Lorenzo, the Saint Vincent's main restaurant, for lunch (sans reservation, BTW). As Miz Jane Scott is instantly recognizable among those who float in a certain rarefied ecosystem, the restaurant's maître d' showed us to a prime table to people-watch. Over the course of my Caesar salad with a side of truffle fries, I took in some fabulous action à la old-school New Orleans ladies convening for lunch. Jane Scott gave me the Hollywood movie pitch, a 90-second background story on the hotel. A beloved, slightly eccentric philanthropist from the 19th century, Margaret Haughery, opened an orphanage and erected this building. In a page-turner summer- read way, Jane Scott pointed to a back door and said, "That's where kids were left for a life at the orphanage." Sotto voce, she added that the door is now part of a chic nightclub/lounge, Chapel Club. That scratching of the surface led me to further digging. Haughery, an orphan herself, was born in Ireland in 1813 and made her way in 1835 to New Orleans, where she started a successful bakery, and was dubbed "Our Margaret" by the community due to her endless philanthropy. In 1861, she founded The Saint Vincent's Infant Asylum, a refuge for newborns and older children, in the red brick building that was iconic even then. Two years after her death, a statue was erected Hotel Saint Chic Paradise Lounge Hotel Saint Vincent in New Orleans 120