I was in the Belvedere on the last night that it operated as a hotel on Dec. 31, 1990. It was New Year’s Eve, and a group of friends had been out on the town. I don’t recall the exact agenda anymore, but it likely included some stops at a few house parties and some bars in Fells Point, and sometime around 3 a.m., we made our way to the Club Charles, which
traditionally remains open all night long on New Year’s Eve.

There, we ran into some other friends who were in town for the evening from Frederick, and had booked a room at the Belvedere for the night. As all of us were leaving the Club Charles several hours later as the sun was coming up, they invited the lot of us back to their room at the hotel to continue toasting the new year. (Where we got the booze, or why we thought this was a good idea, are also lost to me, at my advanced age.) And that was the final night in its long history that the Belvedere was a hotel.

Of course, it wasn’t the end of the Belvedere, though. A developer stepped in and did an extensive renovation, turning the warren of hotel rooms and suites into condominiums, and keeping the hotel’s signature gathering spots— The Owl Bar and the 13th Floor Lounge— intact, as well as its ornate ballrooms. Sadly, the beautiful John Eager Howard Room did not survive as a high-end restaurant— it briefly became a disco (!) before becoming a private rental space for events.

But its ornate exterior, stolid street presence and familiar silhouette on the city’s skyline continue to ensure the Belvedere’s place as a part of the fabric of the city. It even cropped up on TV several seasons ago on AMC’s “Mad Men” as a plot point when ad man Don Draper and art director Sal traveled to Baltimore to service the London Fog account (and dine at Haussner’s).  For this issue, regular Style contributor (and Belvedere resident) Mikita Brottman has dug through the archives of the Belvedere— now permanently housed as part of the collections of the University of Baltimore library— and has unearthed a trove of quirky anecdotes about life at the Belvedere (page 56). God bless the Belvedere. To this day, it still reminds me of New Year’s Eve.

Brian Michael Lawrence
Editor-in-Chief
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