HOTEL PENNSYLVANIA.

You get a sense of the size of the beast here. In other cities those four wings might face a park, but here it's just the side view on anotherwise ordinary New York Street.

The sheer face it presented to Penn Station provide the new arrival with a sense of just what he was up against.

For a while it was facing demolition, but its owners have abandoned plans to knock it down and build an office tower. They've promised renovation to bring it back to its former glory.

I don't know how much glory it had. The public spaces, sure; hotels of this vintage always had a nice lobby, a few elegant ballrooms. But once you got up to your room, it wasn't exactly Versailles.