L.A. Heads West for Ian Schrager’s New Waikiki Hotel Opening, “The Edition”

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While half of L.A. was in Las Vegas this weekend or at LA concerts, such as LCD Soundsystem, The National, Die Antwoord, or Incubus, the other half was nestled on the Hawaiian Islands for an all-star getaway with Angeleno’s finest including: Mamie GumerDanny Masterson, Bijou Phillips, Donovan Leitch with wife Kristy Hume and daughter, Chris Huvane, Kevin Dillon, Shanea Grimes, Tarynn Manning, Whitney Port, Christina Aguilera, Amber Valletta, Dylan Lauren, Jamie Lynn Sigler, Rashida Jones, Vanessa Hudgens, Arielle Vandenberg, Billy and Jennifer Morrison, LA native Dj Devin Lucien, and of course Ian Schrager.

This adventure began the same way most do for me– tumbling out of bed realizing I slept through my alarm clock. It’s 7:45am and my flight time is 8:45. I call a cab while throwing on the first dress I can grab and zipping up the suitcase I had 87% packed the night before. I shoot out the door and jump in the cab saying, “LAX. I have 50 minutes before my plane leaves. Am I crazy for thinking I can do this?”

Standing in line at Delta, I found myself with 3 options from a lovely employee who laughed when I asked if I could make the flight.

1 – Cancel. Go home.

2 – Pay $900 and fly out tomorrow.

3 – Pay $50 get on the next flight to Salt Lake City – yep, Utah, then from there head on up to Seattle where I’d finally board a plane to Honolulu and make it to Hawaii by evening. An added 8-10 hours.

I decided to go with the adventure and respect for my old boss who’d invited me on the trip and I headed to gate 14C to go to Utah. You can read more about this debuckle on my blog – http://www.angies30before30blog.com/.

Some things you should know about the Edition:

The Edition hotel is the first joint-venture project between Marriott and Ian Schrager. If this one works, Marriott is looking to roll out a chain of these hotels to attract the hip hotel clientele.

Harrison+Shriftman put together the grand opening this weekend, although the property itself opened its doors on September 25th.

Ian Schrager personally recruited over friend of the Truffle Laura Modica to be head of nightlife and bars at the Edition hotel; previously she was Director of Bars and Nightlife at the Roosevelt Hotel and also The Mondrian.

This hotel is interesting because it is really the first scenester hotel in Hawaii, that is right on the beach.

Pics from Ian Schrager and Wireimage and friends

Billy Morrison and Donovan Leitch and children

Dono off the falls

Danny & Bijou

Christina with Ian and her producer Tricky

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Is Paris Hilton the Dr. Dre of reality TV stars?

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Ever noticed that almost every reality star is FROM L.A.? You may not have noticed if you didn’t go to school with ten of them — but we did and we are here to take you on a deeper look at all the L.A. Natives from Beverly High, Crossroads (Spencer Pratt, Roxy Olin, Whitney Port), Buckley (Paris Hilton, Kim Stewart, Nichole Richie), and Malibu High (Brody Jenner, Chad Rogers) who have single-handedly created a world of reality shows between them and their friends – ALL STARTING WITH PARIS.

In 2004, when I was at The Lounge on a Thursday, or a Monday at Joseph’s (thank you Bolthouse), Paris would strut in with Kim Stewart, Nichole Richie, Caroline d’Amore, her sister Nicky Hilton, Kim Kardashian and possie. The paps out back Jen Rosero use to hold at bay with her giant fist would DIE over Paris coming out – cause she’s model tall and model thin and model pretty; add in a household name like Hilton and you have a celebrity in the making.

Enter Untitled Management – the “IT” Management company of the day who was sister companies with Maverick Films (Madonna) who was still in it’s infancy and later turned into Mark Morgan films (my old boss – love Mark) who is responsible for a little series called TWILIGHT. Jason Moore at Untiled Management was very looped in, very charismatic, all over town, knew everyone, etc and basically turned local celebrity Paris Hilton into household name.

Paris is like the Dr Dre of reality stars because for every person she makes famous, they make three people famous, and they make three people famous! Paris even has a mentor who brought her up (not really but) Jamie Johnson paved way for it to drool over “children of” on TV and was too ahead of his time, with his sort of weird, kind of amazing doc Born Rich (2003), about NY kids.

  • From Paris, The Simple Life was born and Nicole Richie got famous, from Nicole, Rachel Zoe (her stylist) got famous and got her own show The Rachel Zoe Project. Taylor Jacobson (Beverly Hills High), is Rachels assistant on “The Rachel Zoe Project.” Also, from Nicole Richie, the much loved Adam Goldstein aka DJ AM (RIP) got famous and was eventually given his own MTV show Gone Too Far which was aired after his death :(
  • From Paris, her mother Kathy Hilton got famous and was given her own realty show called I Want To Be a Hilton on NBC.
  • From Paris, her aunts Kim and Kyle Richards became recognizable to the casting directors of the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills who immediately decided to build the cast around Kim and Kyle Richards. Kyle brought on her bff Lisa Vanderpump (love her!) and Lisa brought on Adrienne Maloof and Adrienne brought on Taylor and Camille.
  • From Paris, Kim Stewart got famous who is the daughter of Rod Stewart and older sister of Sean Stewart. Sean Stewart was cast on Celebrtiy Rehab which also featured L.A. native Seth Binzer (Crazytown and I think went to Beverly but I know for sure he was in CBS ;) his tag name was “Back”). He was later cast of Sons of Hollywood with Randy Spelling (John Thomas Dye) and David Weintraub, all LA Natives. Tori Spelling also landed a show with her husband Tori & Dean.
  • From Paris, Nicky Hilton got famous and from her, David Katzenberg (Harvard-Westlake) her bf got famous – watch for his new MTV show HARD TIMES.)
  • From Paris, Caroline d’Amore got famous and she had a little Miami show she hosted briefly but also got famous for being hot, being a hot Dj, and being – BY FAR – the sassiest girl on the catlwalk every year Smashbox had LA Fashion Week, and at every To Be Free show (when Spin Shoppe and The Alliance use to host), etc.
  • Simple Life paves the way for Filthy Rich cattle drive - Courtenay Semel and Kourtney Kardashian are cast.
  • From Paris, Kim Kardashian got famous because they use to go out a lo. Soon Keeping up with the Kardashians is born. Kim paves the way for her sisters to become stars and they branch out with Kourtney and Khloe Take Miami. Then Kim’s friends and sometimes publicists Jonathan Cheban and Simon Huck got the showThe Spin Crowd based on their company Command PR.
  • Keeping up with the Kardashians paves the way for Pretty Wild with Alexis Mieiers from (or maybe not) The Bling Ring (who robbed Orlando Bloom, etc.).
  • From Paris, Brody Jenner got famous. They use to hang out a lot and were friends from high school. Brody is Kim Kardashian’s step-brother and Spencer Pratt is his best from from Crossroads high school in Santa Monica. Spencer was sort of masterminded the entire Princes of Malibu show (remember that? re watch it – its good and very truthful about Malibu Colony). After the Princes of Malibu, Brody was seen on The Real OC all the time with his friends 3 promoter buddies Taylor Mosher (LA native, promoter and designer for ArchAngel and known as “Sleazy T” on The Hills), Ryan Cook (the adorable Canadian promoter with blonde curls, always on The Hills), and Frankie Delgado (who I love, also a promoter and a regular on The Hills). A little side not but Jared Najjar used to be the financier behind Brody and Spencer’s success and helped them start all start Archangel jewelry. Jared recently opened Prism gallery on Sunset and has a lot of support from modern art world royalty like Dasha Zhukova and PC Valbormida and even hosted the after for the annual MOCA gala during it’s first year. From The Hills, Lauren’s boss at People’s Revolution, Kelly Coutrone got her own spin -off show Kell on Earth.
  • From the Real OC, The Hills was born. Spencer Pratt was responsible for getting his friends from Crossroads (high school) in Los Angeles on the show - Whitney Port,who later brought on Roxy Olin and his sister Stephanie Pratt (Crossroads).
  • Then The Hills segways into The City and Whitney brings along bff Roxy Olin (also a Crossroads girl)- on which Olivia Palmero, already made famous by www.socialightrank.com (now defunct), becomes a reality star
  • The City with Olivia Palmero paves the way for High Socity with Tinsely Mortimer
  • LA / Malibu native Chad Rogers, a realtor at Paris Hilton’s dad’s company Hilton & Hyland and friend of Paris, gets a show -Million Dollar Listing - with two other realtors Josh Flagg and Madison Hildebrand - all of whom happen to also be LA Natives - coincidence? I think not!
  • Paris’ new show on Oxygen, ”The New Untitled Paris Hilton Project,” will feature her new gang of closest friends Brooke Mueller (Charlie Sheen’s ex), Jennifer Rovero (Hilton’s photographer, and former Playboy model and ex-girlfriend of Fred Durst) and fellow socialite Allison Melnick. Allison - party promoter, celebrity wrangler and bff to Paris – has had many cameos on reality shows already, including P Hil’s My New BFF.

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