Page 30 - The Montecito Journal Magazine Winter Spring 2008

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30
winter
|
spr ing
F
our Seasons Biltmore Resort owner
Ty Warner
recently
completed what turned out to be a seven-year project to
renovate, update, modernize, and in some cases, enlarge the
207 rooms and suites (the hotel had 236, but some smaller rooms have
been combined to create suites) in the 80-year-old Reginald Johnson-
designed Montecito landmark. Included in that renovation were its main
building, the signature tower suite, 11 cottages, half-a-dozen auxiliary
buildings, the kitchen, ballroom, lobby, lounges, bar, restaurants, hallways,
brick paths, passageways, and other incidental spaces. Warner also oversaw
a major re-landscaping of the grounds of the nearly 20-acre oceanfront
site. “There are three thousand different species of plants and seventy-eight
Landmarks
& Lodging
by James Buckley
The large terra cotta tiles seen in front on this portion of the Biltmore
lobby have been buffed and polished for over 70 years; when
a number of them had to be replaced elsewhere in the hotel, an
extended and expensive process was used to match the old with the
new; original cast iron and hand-blown seeded glass chandeliers
are built to shake, not shatter, in case of an earthquake. Heavy
hand-stenciled beams overhead are built of either timber or concrete,
but are indistinguishable from one another.
Sprucing Up The Biltmore