The Chelsea Hotel has been home to cultural icons from Janis Joplin and Andy Warhol for decades. As controversial renovations continue, Colin Miller photographs the hotel’s last remaining apartments and their residents
In 2015, an architecture firm approached me to take some photographs of the renovations they’d made to the historic Chelsea Hotel after the building was sold. The photographs I took were forgettable, but when I looked down the iron staircase I saw something of the hotel’s former glory. Pieces of the tenants’ artwork decorated the stairwell and amid the construction mess were visible signs of a vibrant community of residents who cared deeply for their home. I had only a vague sense of the Chelsea then, primarily through the film Sid and Nancy and from living in New York on the edge of the punk scene.
An aura of fame and creativity emanated from the hotel. Former residents include Allan Ginsberg, Arthur Miller, Stanley Kubrick, Bob Dylan and Patti Smith; Dylan Thomas and Nancy Spungen died there; Madonna lived and shot her Sex book there, and Leonard Cohen wrote two songs about the affair he had there with Janis Joplin. Struck by what I had seen, I set out to photograph the homes of the last remaining residents before the historic units were further sterilised. The Chelsea’s demise was imminent; I had a precious few months before it would all disappear.
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