La Fonda on the Plaza in downtown Santa Fe, New Mexico, changed hands last week, but reportedly little else will change with the historic hotel, according to the Santa Fe New Mexican newspaper.
The Ballen family had owned the hotel for more than four decades. They turned over the assets to Jennifer Kimball, a current chairwoman of the board, and her brother, Philip Wise, a managing partner of Cienda Partners real-estate firm in Dallas. The Ballens and Wises were described as longtime family friends.
Kimball will continue as board chairwoman of the new company, La Fonda Holdings LLC. The change in ownership is not expected to have any impact on the hotel’s 225 employees. The sale is expected to close in the next few weeks.
“The Ballen family decided this was the right time to sell because [La Fonda] will still be family owned,” Kimball said. […]
Penina Ballen, who recalls watching Fiesta parades from the hotel roof (packed in like sardines) and meeting actor Peter Lorre there, said her father was “adamant that he didn’t want La Fonda to become another Ritz-Carlton or chain hotel.”
Monday’s announcement, Kimball said, “ensured that is not going to happen. … Nothing [about La Fonda] is changing other than who owns it.” […]
Kimball declined to give the purchase price. But she did say that the 55 shareholders — who, in addition to Kimball, include the comptroller, the hotel’s head of human resources, the head housekeeper and chief engineer — would receive a nice check.
La Fonda also finished a major renovation about a year ago that aimed to bring the hotel closer to the look that famed architect Mary Colter initially envisioned.
La Fonda sits less than a block from the 1926-1937 alignment of Route 66 that goes into downtown. Even though La Fonda was built in 1922, records show an inn has been located at that site as far back as 1607 as the first business in town.
(Image of La Fonda entrance by Robert Reck via La Fonda)
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