The Ritz-Carlton Hotel

The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company, L.L.C. is the parent company to the luxury hotel chain, The Ritz-Carlton Hotels. Ritz-Carlton operates 87 luxury hotels and resorts in major cities and resorts in 29 countries and territories.

The current company was founded in 1983, when the previous owners sold the brand name to create The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company, L.L.C., based in Boston, Massachusetts, which expanded the brand to other locations. The hotel company is today a subsidiary of Marriott International.

Predecessor Company

Ritz, Carlton and Ritz-Carlton in Europe

The story of The Ritz-Carlton begins with Swiss hotelier César Ritz who was well known in the hotel industry as the “king of hoteliers and hotelier to kings”. Ritz redefined luxury accommodation in Europe with his management of The Ritz in Paris and the Carlton Hotel in London, among others. He and the renowned chef from his hotels, Auguste Escoffier, opened a la carte restaurants known as Ritz-Carlton on board the Hamburg-Amerika Line ocean liners SS Amerika in 1905 and SS Imperator in 1913. The restaurants on those ships ceased operating in 1914 with the outbreak of World War I. Although Ritz died in 1918, his wife Marie continued the tradition of opening hotels in his name.

The Ritz-Carlton in North America

In 1911, the Ritz company announced its intention to expand to North America. The Ritz-Carlton Investing Company was established by Albert Keller, who bought and franchised the name in the United States. The first Ritz-Carlton Hotel in the U.S. opened in New York in 1911. It was located at 46th Street and Madison Avenue. Louis Diat ran the kitchens and invented Vichyssoise there. The Ritz-Carlton Philadelphia followed in 1913 at Broad & Walnut streets, designed by Horace Trumbauer and Warren & Wetmore. The Ritz-Carlton Montreal opened in 1912, not owned by Keller as it was located in Canada. Keller’s Ritz-Carlton Atlantic City opened in 1921.

The first Ritz-Carlton chain

In the early 1920s, the Ritz-Carlton chain consisted of the following 15 hotels:

Argentina

• Plaza Hotel Buenos Aires

France

• Ritz Hotel, Paris
• Imperial Hotel, Menton
• Royal Hotel, Évian-les-Bains
• Splendide Hotel, Évian-les-Bains

Italy

• Grand Hotel Excelsior, Rome
• Grand Hotel, Rome (today The St. Regis Rome)
• Grand Hotel and New Casino, Rapallo
• Grand Hotel et des Iles Borromees, Lake Maggiore
• Excelsior Hotel, Naples

Switzerland

• Grand Hotel National, Lucerne

United Kingdom

• Carlton Hotel, London
• Ritz Hotel, London

United States

• Ritz-Carlton Hotel, New York City
• Ritz-Carlton Hotel, Atlantic City

The Boston Hotel

In October 1926, 29-year-old Edward N. Wyner bought a third-acre parcel at the corner of Arlington and Newbury streets and formed a partnership called The Ritz-Arlington Trust with his father, George, and business associate, John S. Slater.

The trust sold $2.1 million of bonds to finance the construction of an apartment building to be called the Mayflower. The 18-story, 201-foot (61 m) brick building, designed by Strickland, Blodget & Law Architects, was far taller than anything else along Newbury Street at the time. Construction had started on the second floor when Wyner was persuaded by then-Mayor James Michael Curly to make the Mayflower a world-class, 300-room Ritz-Carlton Hotel, which opened May 19, 1927. Room rates were $5 to $15 per night; $40 per night for suites.

After a hugely successful opening, the stock market crash of 1929 and ensuing Depression brought financial difficulties. The Wyner family funded the hotel’s operating losses during the early 1930s, although the interest on the bonds went unpaid. Still in 1933, when only 30 guests were registered in the hotel, Wyner turned on the lights in every guest room to give the appearance the hotel was full.

Decline of the first Ritz-Carlton chain

The Philadelphia location was converted to an office building after only a few years in operation. The Atlantic City hotel was sold to Schine Hotels in the late 1940s, and later Sheraton Hotels in 1959. The New York hotel was demolished in 1951, leaving only the Boston location.

Edward Wyner died of a heart attack on December 5, 1961. His six sons tried to continue operation of the Boston hotel, but were unable to overcome difficulties, and decided to sell.

The Blakeley Years: 1964-1983

The unpaid interest on the bonds dissuaded many from trying to buy the hotel. But Cabot, Cabot & Forbes principal Gerald F. Blakeley Jr. was interested. After more than a year of legal work, Hale and Dorr succeeded at clearing the bond obligations, and in October 1964 Blakeley and associates Paul Hellmuth and Charles Spaulding acquired the Ritz-Carlton Boston for $3.8 million.

“Out of the 20 years I owned it, it made money three years. The other years it broke even, but from a public relations standpoint for CC&F, it was a tremendous asset,” said Blakeley, who completed a 19-story Ritz-Carlton luxury condominium complex on land adjacent to the hotel in 1981.

In the late 1960s Blakeley obtained the rights to the Ritz-Carlton name in North America (with the exception of Montreal and New York). In June 1978, Blakeley was awarded the rights and privileges of the Ritz-Carlton trademark in the United States and was given a US Service Mark Registration.

In the 1970s, the Ritz-Carlton name was licensed to the builders of a new hotel in Chicago. The Ritz-Carlton Chicago opened in 1975 in a tower atop Water Tower Place. It joined the Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts chain in 1977, as there was no Ritz-Carlton chain at the time. Confusingly, it remained part of Four Seasons for decades, marketed as The Ritz-Carlton Chicago (A Four Seasons Hotel). It had no association with the modern Ritz-Carlton chain, though it used the name and the iconic logo. The property was sold in 2013 and left Four Seasons, joining the modern Ritz-Carlton chain as a franchise on August 1, 2015.

In 1982, Blakely licensed the name to hotelier John B. Coleman for two hotels he was renovating, The Fairfax in Washington, D.C. and the Navarro in New York City. Coleman renamed them The Ritz-Carlton Washington D.C. and The Ritz-Carlton New York in April 1982. Coleman paid Blakely a fee of 1.5 percent of each hotel’s annual gross revenue for use of the name. The two hotels eventually joined the modern chain that would be founded a few years later.

Current Company

In August 1983, Blakeley sold The Ritz-Carlton Boston and the US trademark for $75.5 million to developer William B. Johnson, who assembled a four-person development team in Atlanta, headed by hotelier Horst Schulze, to create The Ritz-Carlton concept and established The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Co.

In 1988, Johnson subsequently obtained the exclusive rights to The Ritz-Carlton name throughout the world except for the 210-room Hotel-Ritz Paris, The Ritz-Carlton at Water Tower Place in Chicago, and The Ritz-Carlton in Montreal.