The silver service alone cost a quarter of a million 1910 dollars, while a huge painting by Georges Rochegrosse cost something like $50,000.
The bill for interior renovations and decor, under Erkins’ direction with Stern Brothers department store acting as general contractor, came to $1,250,000, a sum that borders on $30 million in today’s dollars. The team sunk millions into gutting the old Saranac Hotel and turning it into a fantasy Babylonian stage set worthy of the Hippodrome. It was financed by a consortium of investors that included architect/decorator Henry Erkins and John Murray, impressario of the almost-as-splendiferous Murray’s Roman Gardens, also designed by Erkins. The after-theater eatery was designed to be the showplace of Times Square. Given its fate, how perfect was it that the crowning jewel of the interior decor was a billboard-sized painting of the fall of Babylon installed prominently on a landing of the 22-ft wide staircase?
Could anyone have guessed that in a mere four months this splendid “lobster palace” would fail? Its enormous cost and the stunning, over-the-top lavishness of its interior set a new standard for opulence on the glittering White Way. In 1910 the media was abuzz with the new Café de l’Opera on Broadway between 41st and 42nd streets in NYC.
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