No one would dispute that TWA Hotel itself honors the legacy of Trans World Airlines, which officially ended on Tuesday, July 1, 2003 — 2.5 years after it was acquired by American Airlines — and pays tribute to the iconic airline. A hotel is where one stays to sleep or get some rest, though — but is cool 1960s kitsch enough to want to stay in a TWA Hotel room?
TWA Hotel Room: Is 1960s Kitsch Enough?
As with other carpeted areas of TWA Hotel, the carpet of the curved hallway is red. The Do Not Disturb sign is one of the many items in the room which are designed to evoke the history of Trans World Airlines.
Once entering the room, a closet with a bar of sorts is on one side. The entrance to the bathroom is on the other side of the short hallway.
The “closet” is really no more than a shallow open space with six places to hang clothes and other things. The right side has glasses, a miniature refrigerator, and a drawer.
Although the lamps and nightstand tables did look like they were from the 1960s, the bed was fine but nothing special.
What was really cool were the three posters above the bed — in this case, advertisements to fly as a passenger Trans World Airlines to Egypt, Paris, and Disneyland. Other rooms may have different posters hanging above the bed.
Flat screen televisions with their remote controls were not a product of the 1960s; but the table desk, two chairs, lamps, and telephone certainly were. Seeing inside of the room from the outside is very easy to do both during the day and at night. Be sure that you close the shades to the windows if you want privacy in the room.
Electrical outlets were available in the room; but they were not plentiful. At least two sets of outlets were available by the table desk area. Available in the room are pencils and a pad of paper adorning the TWA logo. The rotary dial telephone actually works, with instructions in the middle of the rotary dial itself to dial 0 For Front Desk; 1+ For Outside Hotel; and 7+ Room No. For Inside Hotel.
The Bathroom
The bathroom in the room was nothing remarkable. It was simply a typical bathroom which one would find in a hotel room.
Other than the bar of soap and dispenser bottles in the shower area, nothing about this bathroom says 1960s or Trans World Airlines. A 1960s toilet might be welcome by some people because their flushes were more powerful than the toilets with tanks that are currently used.
The View
If you believe that you will get a view of the runway at the airport, think again. Unless you get lucky or pay extra, you may get a view of the roadways and parts of the airport instead. If you look closely in the photograph below, you will see a British Airways airplane and a couple of other airplanes in the distance.
Final Boarding Call
When checking out of the room, simply drop your TWA Hotel key into a gold drop box! Exclamation marks are required at this point! Even if you ask a question or use an incomplete sentence!
I could have procured the room for a special rate of approximately $290.00 per night, which included all taxes and fees — but I did not like the following statement:
A deposit in the amount of your total stay will be charged at booking. A $10 fee plus tax applies for any modifications and cancellations.
Reservations can be cancelled or modified 24 hours prior to your arrival date.
Instead, I was able to get a room elsewhere for $161.90 per night, which included all taxes and fees — and earn membership points in the process — so I hesitantly opted not to stay at the TWA Hotel. I was not sorry, as that was a good decision.
The room shown in this article was one in which a colleague stayed; and he was kind enough to let me take photographs of the room. He eventually informed me that he paid more than $400.00 for the night in that room. He vowed never to do that again.
I must agree. Other than the graphics and decor, that room was not worth half that rate, in my opinion.
You can visit the TWA Hotel and enjoy all of the nostalgia without having to pay a single penny — let alone spend several hundred dollars per night for a room which does not warrant that expense, in my opinion…
All photographs ©2022 by Brian Cohen.
