The Birmingham age-herald., 1906-05-11
From the New York World.

From the New York World.
 ~ AST in size. resplendent in furnish O ings, the epitome of luxury from
 v roof to basement, the Hotel Bel mont will throw its doors open to the public this morning.
 Among the 300 hosteleries In New York, the greatest hotel city in the world. the Belmont is of the upper ten. From base ment to cornice 1t scars twenty-one stories above the pavement of Forty-second street and Fourth avenue. Its cost is com puted at s 100000 for building and equip ment.
 From o'clock yesterday until mid night the big hotel was crowded with visitors, curious to see what a perfectly appointed Twentieth century hotel looked like. They trod upon marble floors. they climbed marble stairways, they leaned over marble balconies. Over their heads shone mysterious lights. from which were reflected the paintings on the ceil- ing. like pastels of remote sunset clouds.
 On either side of the stairway leading to the lobby are big round trees in tubs. Palms are everywhere-palms big enough to be respectable in a tropical forest.
 The huge windows of the main floor are hung in sumptuous folds of crimson velour. Everywhere there are hooks and deep, luxurious chairs, and huge mir TOTS, which seem to spread the floor space into the width of city block.
 The main features are space and light and cheerfulness. There are no draperies ,1Arp ar to take away persons appetite.
 The garden" beautiful room to the right of the hotel lobby, will seat 200 guests at round dining tables, where they may be regaled with music and re- treatments. On the left of the lobby, at the rear of the long main hall. Is the restaurant, long wide room in light and dark shades of red, heavily carpeted and lighted with a thousand electric globes.
 From the mezzanine floor the lobby Is overlooked on either hand by marble bal comics. On this and the main floor the walls are of panels of light gray sand- stone, with futed columns of red and white marble at intervals. Supporting the lobby roof are the famous stone caryatids and telamons designed by Mrs. Harry Payne Whitney, formerly Miss Gertrude vanderbilt. They are huge and impressive. and seem fully capable of holding all the upper stories of the Bel mont upon their mighty shoulders.
 Below ground, under the lobby, are the mems cafe. grillroom and rathskelier, spacious and roomy, filled with heavy ta ables and chairs of dark mission oak, The wall paneling is also of dark, stained wood, and the floor is tiled In red and gray.
 Throughout the entire hotel the builders and furnishers of the Belmont seem to have cut loose from the fixed traditions of the past. There Is nothing anywhere in the vast color scheme that would tend to give a man the blues. The ladies' break fast-room is a poem in pearl gray and pale yellow walls and mingled shades of old rose. a thing as daring in its way as the famous blue and yellow room of Whistler.
 The gray color scheme seems to run to a certain extent throughout the en- tire hotel. The main dining room Is Of gray and cerise. with frescoes represent ing the seasons on the walls.
 In all the larger rooms are huge chan deliers of cut glass. which blaze like con stelIations of diamonds.
 The hotel office desk is done in g dark shade of oak The elevators. of which there are seventeen, have mirrored doors, and are furnished with air cushions for the safety of patrons.
 Tho state apartments are on the nst