The Fascinating History of Women-Only Residences

Scarlett Harris
·5 min read

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Photos: Getty Images. Illustration: Lizzie Soufleris.

Once upon a time—from the late 1800s to the mid 20th century, to be more precise—a mini phenomenon swept the nation. Hoards of young women were moving to big cities as they entered the workforce. A lot of them needed places to stay before they met their husbands and retired to the suburbs (as society directed them to strive toward). And in an era when women faced restrictions when renting, and a father or spouse had to cosign for a woman to buy property, they were looking for lodging while they made their way in the world. Enter: the women’s hotels.

You’ve probably heard of the more famous ones, such as New York City’s Martha Washington Hotel, the Allerton, and the Barbizon, which hosted Joan Didion and Grace Kelly and even made a fictionalized appearance in Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar. Women could have their own living quarters, which was usually a studio with shared bathroom facilities or sometimes a one-bedroom, and they had some meals provided. It was basically a stopgap between a college dorm and a family home. While most of these hotels expended their purpose by the time the women’s liberation and Civil Rights movements took hold in the 1960s and ’70s, and were converted into all-gender apartment buildings or demolished, some were still in operation into the 21st century. A handful of Barbizon residents remained in rent-controlled apartments when the hotel was converted to condos in 2006 (men were allowed to check in starting in 1981), and the building that housed the women-only Webster Apartments in midtown Manhattan was sold in in 2023.

An elevator girl at the Martha Washington Hotel, circa 1903

Elevator Girl

An elevator girl at the Martha Washington Hotel, circa 1903
Photo: Heritage Images/Getty Images

While the allure of freedom of choice that coincided with second-wave feminism meant the rigid guidelines of living at women’s hotels were undesirable to newly liberated women, there is a certain wistfulness about the community they provided in our increasingly individualistic and capitalistic society. (Some of these hotels had set curfews, and men were not allowed in certain areas of the building at all—it’s no coincidence that the only remaining women’s hotels are run by religious institutions.) This nostalgia for “vanished ways of living” was partly what inspired author Daniel M. Lavery to write his latest novel, Women’s Hotel, published by HarperVia on October 15. Women’s Hotel follows a motley crew of residents at the fictional Beidermeier, inspired by the Barbizon, during its waning days in the 1960s.

The exterior of the Martha Washington Hotel in New York City in the early 20th century.

Martha Washington Hotel

The exterior of the Martha Washington Hotel in New York City in the early 20th century.
Photo: William J. Roege/The New York Historical Society/Getty Images

“[The book] is trying to have it both ways: it’s right that they’re gone because they didn’t work, but oh, how beautifully they didn’t work, and wouldn’t we like to imagine what that was like,” Lavery tells AD. “There’s a sense in the book that these characters are living in a place that would have been cool to live in 30 years earlier. And some of them did live there 30 years earlier! And some of them [live there] because it’s easy and cheap and easier than figuring out what else they would rather do.”

An air-raid shelter at Allerton House, also known as the Allerton Hotel for Women, in 1941

New York Hotel Air Raid Shelter

An air-raid shelter at Allerton House, also known as the Allerton Hotel for Women, in 1941
Photo: Bettmann / Getty Images

These residential hotels were equipped with many of the same amenities as regular hotels, such as a pool, gym, and oftentimes post offices, hair salons, and pharmacies—among other businesses. The Barbizon even had a recital room! “You could really make a lot of your social life and errands-running within the building for less than you might pay for an apartment in a similar neighborhood,” Lavery marvels. It feels harder to find that type of community today, so it’s no wonder groups of young people are buying houses together. Anecdotally, both Lavery and I exchanged stories of our friend groups, joking (except not really) about buying an apartment building with communal conveniences such as a personal chef so we can have our own spaces but share the costs of living.

“It’s a fine line: When people don’t have enough independence, they want independence; and when they have too much independence, they want less of it,” Lavery says. “That question of how much do I want to share in the lives of others versus how much do I want to be left to my own devices.”

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The Fair Housing Act of 1968 would make it harder for property owners to only rent to tenants of one gender; however, women’s hotels existed in the liminal space between the traditional notion of a “transient” hotel arrangement and the intention of the tenant to stay longer, as United States v. Columbus Country Club (1990) defined. As most women spent no more than two to five years at these hotels, the establishments that remained after this legislation was passed may have been exempt from the act via this loophole. Today, such an endeavor could likely go the way of the controversial women’s coworking space The Wing, which was sued by a man for gender discrimination in 2018. There is also greater acceptance of different gender identities and expressions today. (Lavery, who is trans, acknowledges that there might have been closeted trans men living at women’s hotels.) Like the Beidermeier in the book, these residential hotels were indicative of a bygone era. “It became easier to really do what the women’s hotel was gesturing towards,” says Lavery, “which was to live independently.”

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