The Blackstone Hotel is a glittering jewel of a Second Empire French-style building designed by Marshall and Fox between 1908 and 1910, for which Ben received the Chicago AIA award. At 21-stories high, it was Chicago's tallest building. Renovated by Chicago's own gifted Beaux Arts architect, Lucien Lagrange, it re-opened after several years of closure in 2008.The Benjamin Marshall Society marked the hotel's re-opening with its first gala! When F. Scott Fitzgerald visited Lake Forest in 1915 and 1916, the Blackstone was all the rage. For Lake Foresters and northern suburbanites who maintained residences both in the city and up north along the lake, the Blackstone Hotel was the go-to destination.

Among the hotel's frequent visitors (on top of celebrated Hollywood stars, entertainers and notorious mobsters) were the Rockefellers, the Vanderbilts, the Astors, the McCormicks, along with other of the most affluent families on the North Shore. I have often wondered if Scott ever went there while visiting his heartbreak of a love and muse, Ginevra King. After all, the Kings had a mansion on Astor Street and a mansion in Lake Forest. Could Scott have met or seen or heard of Benjamin Marshall in his flowing neckties tooling around the city in his yellow Packard convertible? It's that yellow Phaeton roadster in Scott's 1925 novel, the Great Gatsby that I just can't get out of my mind...

If you haven't seen the Blackstone, it's so worth the visit. And if you have, come back and take another long drink of a look at this French Beaux Arts masterpiece...

On June 18th, 5:30 to 7:30 pm, join the Benjamin Marshall Society at the Blackstone Hotel for a fun gathering, tour and simpatico apéro!

Places are limited so reserve while you can! — $66.00