OP: Waldorf Astoria Ephemera

$475 · Offered by Kitchen Arts & Letters · No longer available

The Waldorf Astoria name evokes glamor and wealth beyond ordinary grasp. After all, the hotel was built by a couple of Astor cousins (Waldorf being the town in Germany from which the family hails). The first location, on 5th Ave and 33rd, was demolished in 1929 to make way for the Empire State Building, and the hotel’s second iteration, which still stands on Park Ave between 49th and 50th, opened in 1931. We’ve assembled here a collection of early- to mid-20th century ephemera from the hotel that sheds light on the high level experience the guests could expect and the degree of regimentation the staff faced. Included are: The hotel directory, which, while undated, would have been in use some time between 1931 and and 1943, based on the Park Ave address and the fact that Oscar Tschirky is still listed as the banquet director (he retired in 1943); hardcover binder Employee Handbook (1937); paperback Diet at the Waldorf-Astoria (1938); staplebound paperback Employer-Employee Relations (1939); staplebound paperback Recipes from the Waldorf-Astoria Home Kitchen (1940); staplebound paperback Employment in the Waldorf-Astoria (1941); staplebound paperback The directory includes handsomely illustrated fold-out maps of the hotel and its galleries of murals by Louis Rigal, Jose Maria Sert, and Victor White. And the maps prove necessary, as the following pages reveal the hotel to be a veritable city within the city. Occupying real estate within the hotel are banks, jewelers, florists, a

• Binding: Hardcover

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