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MOLLIES HOTEL, AUCKLAND, NEW ZEALAND
Operatic voices echo off the white plaster walls in the lobby at Mollies, a 14-suite hotel near Auckland's fashionable Ponsonby district.The sounds are of budding tenors and sopranos honing their skills under the tutelage of the hotel's owner, Frances Wilson. After years of working as a pianist and voice teacher in Europe and the United States,Wilson returned to her native New Zealand in 2001 with her husband, Stephen Fitzgerald, to run her family's hotel.
Wilson's mother, Mollie, had managed the property for decades, and she had only one request for the couple: "Do something grand."The pianist and her set-designer husband responded by restoring the Victorian mansion and filling it with a staggering array of antiques and objects they had collected' during their travels. The result-an eclectic mix of Fitzgerald's decorating talents and Wilson's artistic sensibilities (she produced Mozart's Ldomeneo in Auckland)-does not lack for drama. Gilt Italian
mirrors line the long marbled halls.
Chinese tapestries hang from the hotel's 16-foot-
high walls. Guests sitting in Edwardian chairs positioned on leopard skin rugs in the suites can view, " through French doors, Mollies' traditional English gardens and Auckland's Harbor Bridge and Waitemata Harbor. Six of the hotel's 14 suites have sitting rooms with grand pianos, one of which is accompanied by a full-size, gilded harp.
Evenings at Mollies typically end with senior members of the staff, all of whom have professionalquality voices, singing arias accompanied by Wilson on the piano in the hotel's dining room. When they are in town, New Zealand's opera stars frequently drop by and sing for their suppers.
Mollies, +64.9.376.3489, www.mollies.co.nz
LOCATION
Just outside central Auckland, New Zealand, near the restaurants, clubs, and shops of the city's fashionable Ponsonby district.
ACCOMMODATIONS
Six of the hotel's 14 suites have sitting rooms with grand pianos and views of the Auckland skyline and Waitemata Harbor.
FACILITIES
A spa and traditional English gardens.
DINING
The hotel's restaurant offers contemporary New Zealand cuisine with an emphasis on
seafood. Entrees include crayfish served with savoy cabbage, mushrooms. foie gras, and herb nage, as well
as hapuka fish with white bean, fennel, grapefruit, and pork belly.
CONCIERGE RECOMMENDS
Sail to nearby Waiheke and take a guided tour of the island's nature trails and wineries.
RATES
Junior suites from $365, premium villa suites from $585. |
