The Beatniks Are Back at San Fran's Hotel Emblem
Hotel Emblem
San Francisco, California
Cool, $$
In 1948, Jack Kerouac's novel On the Road gave name (and rise to) The Beat Generation, that loose cabal of passionate nonconforming radicals, sexually-awakened hippies, free-roaming hitchhikers, and folks rebelling against the post-war American culture.
Sound familiar? Fast forward 71 years, and today's 21st-century beatniks are as vocal, ready for political change, and hungry for spaces where they can express themselves. They're just usually a little more bougie than their boho forebears. Cue Hotel Emblem, a member of the Viceroy Urban Retreats hotel collection, located in the heart of San Francisco's most vibrant neighborhood, where Nob Hill meets Union Square and the Arts District.
Throughout the hotel are outlets meant to incite free expression: old-fashioned typewriters in the writer's dens, communal bar tables, a book butler, and beatnik-inspired texts displayed on the hallway carpet and guest room walls. (And there are plenty of, er, actual outlets for the devices that power their lives.) The uncensored modern design and pattern play travels throughout the hotel, becoming a visual map of rebellious American generations past and present. Has the hotel taken this theme to the extreme? For sure. Does it also work? Yes. And while room rates might not fit Occupy Wall Street budgets, they can be as low as $199 per night, which is hardly exclusive to the one percent, especially in pricey San Francisco.
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