Chelsea Hotel Bought for $250 Million to Be Transformed Into Condos and Hotel

CHELSEA, NY — The famous Chelsea Hotel's fate is officially to become condos and a smaller hotel, The Real Deal confirmed Tuesday.

The historic building on 23rd Street between Seventh and Eighth avenues, which in Chelsea's golden era housed Joni Mitchell, Mark Twain, Bob Dylan and several other famous authors and musicians, was sold in July to the hoteliers who founded BD Hotels, Richard Born and Ira Drukier. The deal officially closed on Tuesday for $250 million, The Real Deal reported.

Chelsea Hotel's history since 2007 is fraught with tenant harassment at the hands of its management. The Department of Buildings imposed a partial-stop work order on the hotel's construction this month due to BD Hotels' failure to have a "tenant protection plan" in place. BD Hotels had not established a viable safety plan for current tenants on construction to combine two of three apartments on the eight floor and create 22 hotel rooms, according to the DOB.

The pause in construction was just an "insignificant speed bump," Born told The Real Deal on Monday.

At least one of the original units is being preserved. After a nine-year court battle, former tenant Artie Nash won an agreement from Drukier in July to preserve poet Dylan Thomas' former apartment unit in the building while construction goes on around it. After negotiations with a succession of building owners failed, Nash found a partner in Drukier, who agreed to protect most of the apartment and preserve some of its historic items for a museum exhibition Nash is organizing, Curbed reported.

Photo credit: k_tjaaa/Flickr/CC by 2.0