IF YOU WERE A HIPSTER rolling around San Francisco in the early ’80s, the town would look a lot different. The Union Square Apple Store was a Levi’s outlet. There was no Salesforce Tower. There weren’t even any techies yet. Wired was just a gleam in the eye of the editor, lounging in his dilapidated industrial South of Market office.
What you would for sure see was the Phoenix Motel, a low-budget 1950s era motel in the rough-and-tumble Tenderloin neighborhood. The Phoenix’s hip, retro style became chic as folks like David Bowie, Linda Ronstadt, and Johnny Depp started frequenting.
The Phoenix’s mastermind, 26-year-old Chip Conley, bought more small, run-down, historic buildings, and transformed them all, becoming the second-largest operator of boutique hotels in the US.
Seems like that would be plenty for a career, but Chip went on to become a New York Times bestselling author and helped turn Airbnb into the world’s largest hospitality brand.
Then he almost died. And that’s why he started Modern Elder Academy – a new school opening two campuses in Santa Fe next year. We sat down with Chip to explain why Modern Elder is so important.
What was unique about Joie de Vivre hotels?
I was working for a real estate developer in San Francisco, and noticed boutique hotels beginning to pop up. Bill Kimpton was doing them in San Francisco, and Ian Schrager in New York. I thought, This is the future and took my idea for hotel redevelopment to my boss. He thought I was crazy.
So, of course, I thought, I’m 25 years old. I can do this.
All I could afford was a broken down, by-the-hour motel in the worst neighborhood of the Tenderloin. We called it The Phoenix. Now, the interesting thing is through the developer, I’d gotten to know the concert promoter Bill Graham, the biggest in the country. And one day he says to me, Sonny, you should really make a rock ‘n’ roll hotel.
I’m thinking like, Well, I have to figure out how to create something hip, where all these bands will stay and I’ll get to hang out with them! And, amazingly, that’s exactly what happened. Red Hot Chili Peppers, Nirvana, David Bowie…all the 80s bands came to this rock ‘n’ roll hotel.
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Photo SFM
