John Goldwyn and Jeff Klein at San Vicente Bungalows on May 3, 2015. Vivien Killilea/Getty Images for Conde Nast Traveler Logo text Is Jeff Klein looking to open a San Vicente Bungalow in Palm Springs? Or is he looking to cash out?
That was the question left open by The Wall Street Journal’s March 19 bombshell scoop — that Klein, 54, was working with Goldman Sachs and real-estate firm JLL to find a new investment partner for his high-end hospitality empire, long a magnet for A-list celebs and industry climbers, ostensibly as part of an expansion plan.
“We are currently looking at several new locations and evaluating different ways to structure the next phase of growth while protecting the magic and exclusivity,” Klein told the Journal.
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Notably, though, the Journal also reported that Klein would “consider selling a majority or even all of the businesses,” including his West Hollywood and New York properties. In other words, the Journal suggested, he might just take the money and run.
Rambling Reporter gave Klein a call to clear up the confusion and learned that it’s definitely the former — unless, of course, the money ends up being stupid enough for it to be the latter.
“If a ‘fuck you’ offer were to come, of course we would consider it,” Klein replies when asked about the Journal story. “But that’s not the plan.”
Instead, Klein says, he’s hoping to open a slew of new properties, although none in locations more than a car-ride away from L.A. — think Palm Springs and Santa Barbara — where he can continue to serve his core constituency, which includes pretty much every bold-type name in town, from Leo DiCaprio to Prince Harry and Meghan Markle to Hailey Bieber and Taylor Swift, to mention just a few of SVB’s A-list members.
“We’re building something special, where value compounds over time through scarcity and consistency. We are open to the right partner to help us grow, but not to compromise what makes it special,” says Klein, who these days is something of a Hollywood royal himself — as is his husband of nearly 15 years, John Goldwyn, grandson of Samuel.
Since Klein arrived in L.A. two decades ago — he started as a bellman at New York’s Franklin Hotel, his first job after graduating Tulane with a BA in French literature — he’s all but redefined the city’s club space, beginning in 2004, when he turned the decrepit Argyle Hotel into the red-hot center of Sunset Strip nightlife, the Sunset Towers (Ukrainian billionaire Len Blavatnik was reportedly an investor).
When Klein acquired the San Vicente Inn in West Hollywood in 2013, it was a run-down motel that functioned as a gay bathhouse. Six years and $50 million dollars in renovations later, he reopened it as the San Vicente Bungalows, which instantly overtook Soho House as the most coveted private club membership in Hollywood. Partly because Klein took the private part seriously: he was the first to start putting stickers over guests’ phones so that they couldn’t take photographs. Since then, he’s opened SVB outposts in New York and Santa Monica… and soon possibly in Palm Springs and Santa Barbara.
In other words, Klein isn’t going anywhere. Unless he is.
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