Kuraya doesn’t look like much from the street — just a nondescript warehouse on the industrial fringe of the Mission District. But climb the loading-dock stairs, and you’ll find yourself surrounded by some real Japanese booty: hundreds of antique tansu chests, each built for a specific function, from tea preparation to kimono storage.
On a recent afternoon, art handlers in T-shirts and tattoos paced the sixth-floor gallery of the Rubin Museum of Art, wielding levels and hammers. Cowering slightly in a corner in ruby and orange robes were two shy visitors, Lama Karma Tenzin and Lopen Sonam Wangchuk, monks from the remote Himalayan Buddhist kingdom of Bhutan.
The “art hotel” concept has arrived in Australia. The Melbourne-based A Hotels Group, run by an avid art collector, is planning seven art-themed hotels across Australia by 2010. The first, the Storrier, has opened in Sydney.
The Colony Palms Hotel was built in 1936 by the Detroit mobster Al Wertheimer as a front for a brothel and gambling house. But despite its notorious past and a $16 million overhaul, the 56-room white-stucco hotel still resembles a motel on the outside.
Like the bronzed and barely clad bodies that saunter up and down Collins Avenue and Ocean Drive, South Beach is in a constant state of self-improvement. That’s especially true this season, as a wave of new bars, lounges and clubs put up their velvet ropes.
Stand on West Fulton Market in Chicago at around 3 p.m. and witness an incongruous changeover. Forklifts hauling greasy pallets of sliced bacon clear out, as bright young things in stiletto heels and luxury cars roll in. This is Chicago’s meatpacking district.
After surfing Hotel 1000’s website, which tallies the hotel’s many futuristic technologies (a tub that fills from the ceiling, infrared occupancy sensors), you may arrive at the hotel expecting a scene from the Jetsons. If so, the low-tech but stylish lobby will be a letdown. The hotel-of-the-future is actually behind the scenes.
At Jitensha, rare 1940’s and 50’s bike parts are displayed as artifacts behind glass. At the back of the shop are exquisite canvas-and-leather touring bags, woven willow baskets, handmade French tires, and tiny brass bells from Japan.