“The Barbizon” evokes a certain period in New York, and the women who lived there. A landmark in many novels, and a notable setting in others (most famously, Sylvia Plath’s “Bell Jar”), the women’s residence hotel provided a launching point for thousands of starry eyed arrivals to New York City over a span of nearly 80 years.

Paulina Bren’s wide ranging social history of the hotel and its residents is fascinating for both its historical value and its insight into the many famous women who made the hotel a temporary New York home. The founding of the Katherine Gibbs Secretarial School and the Eileen Ford Modeling Agency, and the flourishing of Mademoiselle magazine are set into the frame of the Barbizon and its unique standing as a “safe” home for young women in a potentially dangerous big city.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

This book started out slow for me but about chapter 4, it finally got more interesting - and stayed interesting. This is not only a history of a hotel, but a history of the times. So much change happened in the time period covered and it's fascinating to have so much packed into a cohesive accounting of those changes. The Barbizon was unique - and important for its time. It was enlightening to read about it.

I Have always been intrigued by the Barbizon. Even growing up in Baltimore during the 1980s and '90s it was always where I thought single women living in NYC lived first. It's in so many old movies I felt like I had been there myself. This was a lively look at the history of the place and the women who lived here. Great for any fan of old movies, women's history, or NYC stories.

The Barbizon, by Paulina Bren, is the story of the most famous of the “for women only” residential hotels in Manhattan. Opened during the late 1920’s, it provided a safe destination for young (and not so young) women who wanted to expand their horizons and escape the constraints of home by seeking work and careers in New York. It served this function for hundreds of women well into the 1960’s. Women came for careers in business, theater, modeling, and publishing. While many of the young women came from modest means, it was the beautiful, rich, successful, famous and infamous that created the hotel’s reputation.

Although wrapped in glitter and gossip, this is a multi-layered social history, written by a meticulous historian who conducted voluminous research. The Barbizon is the frame through which we observe the serial loosening and tightening of society’s control over young women. By sharing individual stories of the residents, we learn the inherent contradictions with which they impossibly were tasked with reconciling. Ironically, as the times and social dynamics changed, the need for and economic viability of women’s residential hotels were undermined.

Thanks to NetGalley and Simon and Shuster for the opportunity to read a digital ARC. It brought back memories and gave me a new perspective of the post-WWII era in terms of women’s roles in society.

historical-places-events, historical-research, historical-setting, nonfiction, celebrities, 20th-century*****

This NYC institution housed many of the women who loomed large in the women's movement as well as prominent editors, film and other celebrities, and even an important secretarial school from 1927 until reformatted into apartments for the wealthy. It was a residential hotel like no other and was complete with a dry cleaner, hairdresser, squash courts swimming pool, fashion designs, library, soundproof rooms for musicians and roof gardens in an era when these was a considered to be male amenities. At first some sought to castigate the women and the rules in which there was no male oversight, but it was more like protection from men than by men and it played its own part in laying the path for women's lib. Did you know that during the depression it was illegal for women to have jobs? A wonderful tribute to change and an excellent read.
I requested and received a free temporary ebook from Simon & Schuster via NetGalley. Thank you!

The Barbizon is a history of the famous women’s hotel in New York City from its inception to it’s conversion to condos. This is told through the eyes and stories of some of its residents both famous and not. The research was extensive and the stories were very interesting. While written in chapters loosely based by on epochs the stories were very relevant to the times. I found this book informative and interesting.

Growing up in the 60's and 70's with many independent women in my family I was aware of the career "girl". I aspired to be just like them and work in an office, have my own apartment and do my own thing, but I never would have been brave enough to head to NYC!
This was a great history of the Barbizon as well as a great history of the women who resided within its walls. What was so disheartening to read and realize, is that for the thousands of women living there not much change took place for women in society and in the work place during all those decades. For that matter we still have a long way to go!
I enjoyed reading about the famous residents, the Mademoiselle co-eds, the Women and all the rest.
If I have one complaint it would be that I wish there were more photos included in the book. Maybe the published copy has more photos than the ARC I was lucky enough to read. I hope so!

I think I was expecting a lot more storytelling from this non-fiction book, and that wasn't the way it came across. The Barbizon is the story of the famous New York City "hotel for women", spanning decades as the hotel and city changed immensely. There were interesting parts and certainly whispers of the scandals and gossip I was expecting, but everything just moved along too quickly. The book, I think, took on too large of a scope, trying to tell the story of too many guests in too many years time. I would have appreciated more focus on just a few guests perhaps, less names to keep track of, more in depth description of what life was really like. To be honest, I was most fascinated with the idea of The Women, ladies who lived in rent controlled rooms far beyond the time when the Barbizon was a hotel. I would have liked a lot more of their story.

Overall, not a book I'd recommend unless you are looking for a historical tome on this hotel.

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon and Schuster for my ARC of this book - all opinions are my own.

I found most of the book to be more about the magazine Mademoiselle than the hotel. The beginning and ending is what takes most about it. I did enjoy it though.

The story of the Barbizon is a well-researched and nostalgic look at a place wholly belonging to another era. A hotel where women could go to be adventurous and independent while having a safe haven in the middle of New York.
The list of models, actresses, and writers that stayed there as they started their careers is beyond impressive, and getting a glimpse of life at this exclusive hotel is a time machine. It's full of mini-biographies of women who arrived in New York to explore independence and how their lives went.
I particularly liked how Bren begins at the era that gave birth to the idea of the Barbizon and how that same idea of women being able to take care of themselves is what eventually led to it becoming obsolete.
The only thing I can critique is that I was kind of expecting more of the dark and hidden secrets of the hotel (rumors are that many, many suicides happened there), and only a handful of the darker events within the hotel get mentioned. I understand that the need to stay as close as possible to confirmable and documented events, but a little 'gossip' section would have been morbidly interesting.

Many happy thanks to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for the read!

Thanks to Simon & Schuster and NetGalley for a digital advance reader copy. All comments and opinions are my own.

This was an extremely well-researched book that was for the most part fascinating. I read it just as Women's History Month 2021 launched - perfect timing! This nonfiction historical biography described the history of the Barbizon Hotel in New York as well as the birth of the feminist movement, primarily focusing on the movement's growth in the 1960's and 1970's. Another focal point of the book was the growth of the modeling industry in New York, which I really enjoyed learning about. The book captured the cultural double standard of how men and women were treated in a variety of areas - employment, dating/sex, marriage/childcare, centering mainly on the 1950's and 1960's.

Beginning in the late 1930's through the 1980's, the hotel had an arrangement with Mademoiselle magazine, which allowed a group of 20 young college girls to stay at the Barbizon for a month each summer as a Mademoiselle Guest Editor. Many of the chapters spotlighted one particular woman who had stayed at the hotel, including Joan Didion, Grace Kelly, Gael Greene, and Sylvia Plath. In addition to working at Mademoiselle Magazine, several of the other women who stayed at the Barbizon were models, actors, and dancers. And many attended Katherine Gibbs Secretarial School. Using interviews, letters, books, and articles, the author was able to vividly describe the lifestyle of these young women - their frustrations, limitations, successes and disappointments related to the cultural restrictions of the 1950's and 1960's.

I think this is "must" reading for anyone who wants to know about the birth of the feminist movement.

This book tells the history of the legendary Barbizon Hotel. It was built in 1927 as a safe haven for women coming to New York City to live and work. It was home to many famous people: the "unsinkable" Molly Brown, Liza Minnelli, Grace Kelly, Sylvia Plath, Ali MacGraw, Jaclyn Smith, Phylicia Rashad, Cybill Shepherd,Joan Didion, Diane Johnson, Gael Greene, and Meg Wolitzer, and many more. Mademoiselle magazine boarded its summer interns there, as did Katharine Gibbs Secretarial School its students and the Ford Modeling Agency its young models. Unofrtunately, as the years passed and the times changed , The Barbizon failed to keep up . Today, it no longer exists as a hotel for women. In 2005 it was renovated for condominiums and renamed Barbizon 63.
This book was fascinating. It captured everything in women's history from the Roaring Twenties on. It was like reading a gossip magazine combined with a history book. It was fascinating and I learned so much. I am a huge trivia buff, so I now have a lot more knowledge that I didn't have before. I highly recommend this fascinating book.

When I got this book, I was so excited to start reading it. I guess the book is not what I imagined, and I am not sure what I really thought this book was going to be about. I painfully finished it along with all of the repetitious name dropping of people. I had hoped it would eventually get better, but no so! It seems like it took me forever to finish reading it. Not too much information on the younger ladies I wanted to learn about who lived there, I do thank NetGalley for letting me read this for free.

A fascinating history of both the Barbizon and a certain class of women that stayed at the Barbizon. This is a well-researched history of the era when young women hopefully came to New York City to follow their dreams. It's a portrait of a certain time and place in history and though I wish it had incorporated more of the later years of the Barbizon, it is an unforgettable read. Those women....!! It will make you wish you could have been there!

A stunning history of American women seen through the scrim of The Barbizon in NYC. The residential hotel housed single women only, propelled to pursue their career dreams via post-WWI freedoms and the right to vote. The residents are enthralling ... from actresses Grace Kelly to Ali McGraw, writers Sylvia Plath to Joan Didion, along with fashion models and secretaries all clambering for success in the big city. A 20th Century historical gem!

What a wonderful place this must have been. I think Stage Door the movie was a vague representation of life at the Barbizon. In it each woman had a story a reason for leaving the comfort of home to strike her own path. Like the movie the stories had easy endings and tragic endings. What began as a place to feel safe , historically remained the same for decades. It offered shelter and a sense of place in a town known for its cold and relentless lifestyles. I enjoyed the name dropping but the smaller stories are where the real history lies. A place against the tide.

I have always been fascinated by The Barbizon and was so happy to get an ARC of Paulina Bren's book. Written for the general reader it covers the history of a landmark residential hotel and the women who passed through its doors. It's a history of women - actresses, writers, and more - all women searching for their place in a changing world. I enjoyed every page and I encourage others to get a copy.
My thanks to the publisher Simon & Schuster and to NetGalley for giving me an advance copy in exchange for my honest review.

The Barbizon was the most glamorous of the women-only hotels that cropped up on the New York City skyline in the early 20th century. Opened in 1928, how the Barbizon evolved over the next century is the story of the cultural change in America, especially for women. The 1920s began the era of the "New Woman," the flapper girls who emerged out of the First World War viewing college education and independent working years as an important stepping stone to married life. The goal was still to get married and have a family, but to maybe have something for herself first. The problem is there was no where to live. Previously, working women had been condemned to boarding houses that were run by charities and felt as much. In fact, a woman working in NY could not check into a hotel after 6 pm, unless accompanied with enough luggage to convince the front desk she was not a prostitute. Lest insufficiently sized luggage get her branded a hussy, women sometimes sheltered the night in train stations to avoid the accusation. In this environment, women-only hotels that allowed long term residency options were a necessary convenience.

This book follows The Barbizon through its many incarnations and in doing so chronicles the social and economic changes in an entire nation. First appealing to sophisticated, artistic women with nervous upper middle class parents, the Barbizon shifted focus in the Depression to the increasingly practical working girl. In the 1950s, the hotel became the residence of choice of the city's aspiring actresses and models. Show business could be a scary place for a young woman, but The Barbizon was a safe harbor. It also housed the young guest editors for the magazine "Mademoiselle."

This is where the book struggles with a bit of an identity crisis, because so much of it is taken up with "Mademoiselle." Not just the guest editors program (blown out of proportion in it's importance) but also the inside politics of the magazine and how it changed over the years. Specifically, the author is enamored with one specific "Mademoiselle" guest editor, Sylvia Plath. Given that Plath's residency at the hotel consisted of about one month in 1953, it's hard to understand why she dominates so much of the book.

The Barbizon started to lose its luster in the 1970s, as changing gender politics made a woman-only hotel seem a stodgy relic. The hotel started admitting men, refurnished, and eventually became condos the sold for millions. One of the more interesting topics that isn't touched on enough in the book is The Women-- a group of women who checked into the Barbizon back in the 30s/40s/50s and never left. Under rent control, not only were they paying a pittance but were legally allowed to stay regardless of any renovations. It's an interesting juxtaposition of the old New York of rent control and working class apartments with the new New York of eight-figure condos and neoliberalism where we push out the old (in this case, old women) while putting up a plaque in their honor.

Overall, I enjoyed The Barbizon. The parts about "Mademoiselle" were a bit of a slog, but the beginning and ending parts of the book made up for it. 3.5 stars.

I've always been fascinated by the Barbizon. Many young women came to New York City to establish a career and live in a safe spot. For many the only way parents would let them go is if they stayed in the protected environment of the Barbizon in a dormitory-like environment. The book did not disappoint but it was so much more than a history of the hotel. The author gave a bit of history about the Katharine Gibbs School and the Powers models who all lived there and a large portion was devoted to the guest editors at Mademoiselle. These were all girls in college who won a contest to work at the magazine and live at the Barbizon for one month. Notable residents focused on were Sylvia Plath and Grace Kelly. The book is about early feminism, how the GEs were all their to develop careers in writing and the arts, struggling to make their way in a male dominated world. Now the hotel is no longer but has been converted to pricy condominiums but still there are a few of the old inhabitants still there living hidden away from the new inhabitants.

Thank you to Netgalley and Simon and Schuster for providing me with a copy of this book.

Paulina Bren has documented a slice of life in New York City from the construction of the Barbizon Hotel for Women in the 1920’s through its decline and reinvention in the later part of that century. In this well researched book Bren brings that iconic hotel to life through the many women who passed through its doors, from the famous to the notorious. And then there are the ones who never left: when the hotel was converted to condominiums eleven “Women” were protected by rent control laws and had to be accommodated at the mandated rates.

Bren introduced the reader to the various guests of the Barbizon: students from Katherine Gibbs Secretarial School, models from Eileen Ford Modeling Agency, and winners of a contest for Mademoiselle magazine. She spent a large part of the book documenting the Mademoiselle guest editors—college students chosen from around the country to spend the month of June working for the magazine to produce the August issue. These guest editors included such names as Grace Kelly, Sylvia Plath, Joan Didion and Meg Wolitzer to name a few.

I enjoyed this book from the aspect of the architectural details, the interesting women and the times. Bren has written so much more than a book about a women’s hotel—it is a book about women’s status from the post-war times through women’s liberation.

My thanks to NetGalley and Simon and Schuster for an advance readers copy in exchange for an honest review.