Hotel That Hosted Dylan and the Stones Sells for $23M

The Washington Square Hotel, which inspired Joan Baez to write her classic “Diamond and Rust” when she lived there with Bob Dylan, has sold for $23 million. 

The Paul family, which bought the property in 1973, sold the nine-story hotel at 103 Waverly Place to hotelier the Library Hotel Collection, according to Crain’s New York Business.

According to public records, the 49,213-square-foot hotel property itself sold to the Library Hotel Collection, as Ws Hotel Holdings, for $21,965,000. An attached, 5,900-square-foot restaurant, which had operated as the restaurant North Square, also sold to Ws Hotel Holdings, for $1,035,000. North Square is currently closed for renovation, according to its website. 

Library Hotel Collection received $18 million in financing for the transactions from Metropolitan Commercial Bank. 

The Hotel Earle, as it was first known, opened as an eight-story residential hotel in 1902, adding an identical joined building next door in 1907 and one more floor in 1910. A three-story building on the corner of Waverly and MacDougal streets was added in 1917, according to the property’s website.

The hotel’s location made it a magnet for prominent figures. Ernest Hemingway lived there for three weeks before shipping off to World War I, and poet Dylan Thomas stayed there during his first tour of the U.S.

The hotel hit its stride as a cultural landmark in the 1960s. Folk singer Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, a significant early influence on Dylan, met him and became his mentor there. Roger McGuinn lived there before forming The Byrds, and the Mamas and the Papas wrote their hit “California Dreamin’” at the hotel. Dylan lived there twice: in 1961, and then with Baez in 1964, the same year the Rolling Stones made the hotel the band’s home base for its first U.S. tour.

Frequent guests in later years included author Patricia Highsmith, music pioneer Chuck Berry, and rockers the B-52s and Dee Dee Ramone.

The hotel was renamed the Washington Square Hotel in 1986, and is currently “one of the longest independently run hotels in New York City,” according to The New York Times. 

Library Hotel Collection’s other hotels include four in New York City: Library Hotel at 299 Madison Avenue, Casablanca Hotel at 147 West 43rd Street, Hotel Giraffe at 365 Park Avenue South and Hotel Elysée at 60 East 54th Street. The company also runs hotels in Toronto and Budapest.

It is unclear what the Library Hotel Collection’s exact plans are for the hotel and the restaurant, or who brokered the deal. The company did not immediately respond to a request for information, and the Paul family could not be reached for comment.

Larry Getlen can be reached at lgetlen@commercialobserver.com.