businesstravelerusa.com SEPTEMBER 2019
35
RED HOT
& COOL
A
s technolog y continues to advance and grow more
complex and impersonal, there are still destinations
where we can escape, places to connect to our own
sense of celebrity, and to dream of a glamorous and
glorious past. Follow the scent of Cajun spice and the
bluesy wavelengths of sound to the Gulf-side strong-
hold of New Orleans where a classic past harmonizes
perfectly with the beat of the contemporary traveler.
It has been nearly fourteen years since Hurricane Katrina saturated
this city that lives eight feet below sea level, devastating lives and land-
scape. However there is a spirit in New Orleans, the birthplace of jazz
- music with soul, with wings, that cannot be caged even by nature’s
random cadence. Jazz great Dave Brubeck once said, “Jazz is the first
sign of the return to freedom.”
A trip to New Orleans will transport the visitor back in time 100
years to the birth of jazz, when it seemed the streets existed only in
black and white. In reality, one of the most notorious Red Light Dis-
tricts in New Orleans, called “Storyville,” was the brainchild of city
councilman Sidney Story who was looking for a way to regulate the
proliferation of prostitution that plagued New Orleans at the time.
Storyville, which ultimately became the last “vice district” in New
Orleans, told its infamous tale from 1897 to 1917, when it was
replaced by a more sober and respectable neighborhood.
Flash forward to June 29, 2019, and the opening of the Marquee
Resort in New Orleans, a stone’s throw away from the border of
Storyville. There, the spirit of Storyville and the jazzy narrative that
followed it is expressed through the resort’s mascot and patron saint,
Story Val, made real in a 3D iron sculpture created by Lisa Fedon,
which is suspended on the far wall of the iconic lobby.
Through multimedia use of voice, video, iconography and market-
ing materials, Story Val is present throughout the immersive Marquee
Resort experience, as much an historian as he is a thematic reminder
of the resort’s classic motif.
A TIME & PLACE APART
The Marquee, which is situated in the historic theater district, offers
mainly time share opportunities in its one-, two- and three-bedroom
suites. The 17-story building is designed to reflect the area, and
celebrate the memory of vaudeville, speakeasies, theater and the early
days of cinema.
Through the Bluegreen Vacation Club, “owners” purchase points
that can be used in any of over 40 destinations, each unique. However,
there is something more escapist about the Marquee Resort because
not only does it draw the traveler toward exotic places, but also to an
extraordinary time.
The classic, cinematic décor begins in the lobby where a large screen
loops video of the Bluegreen properties and silent film scenes, the new
and the old coming together in a city most capable of sustaining that
historical divide. The white marble floor leads guests through plush
velvet curtains toward the elevators.
Look up and be greeted by a flowing scroll of a mosaic of words,
lines from great works of literature, especially Shakespeare. At the end
of the hallway, in the frame of an ornate mirror, digital signatures of
the “featured cast” – the names of the guests – loop five at a time for a
fraction of one’s fifteen minutes of fame.
Upon entering the elevator, guests are met on the three facing walls
by the panoramic image of an audience gazing and applauding. This
