Halekulani (hotel)

In 1883, businessman Robert Lewers built a two-story house on the site of the modern hotel's main building. In 1907, Lewers leased the property to journalist Edward Irwin, who converted it to a hotel called the Hau Tree. It was purchased in 1917 by Juliet and Clifford Kimball,^[1] who established it as Halekulani. The Kimballs enlarged the resort over the years, purchasing a neighboring plot of land and adding additional buildings, including a central building designed by C.W. Dickey, and built in 1931.^[5]

Admiral Kimmel, CinC of the US Pacific Fleet, dined at the hotel on the evening of 6 December 1941, the night before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.^[6] After the Kimballs' deaths, their heirs sold the hotel to the Norton Clapp family in 1962 for $4.2 million.

The original Halekulani was a plain residential hotel, more an informal grouping of simple bungalows on simple landscaping, offering inexpensive, unpretentious accommodations, with simple food. Later it grew into a more conventional hotel with numerous buildings containing several rooms each and two restaurants; one being the House Without a Key made famous by the Earl Derr Biggers novel of the same name. The other was the Coral Tree Lanai.^[2] In 1978, the Clapps announced their intention to replace the aging collection of structures with a modern luxury hotel.

On January 15, 1981 the hotel was purchased by Mitsui Fudosan USA and incorporated as the Halekulani Corporation, a U.S. based company.^[7] The current 453-room hotel structure opened in 1984.

Halekulani has received numerous awards, including a World's Best 2005 award from Travel & Leisure magazine.^[8] It received Four Stars from Mobil Travel Guide and a AAA Four Diamonds rating.^[9] The hotel is a member of The Leading Hotels of the World, a marketing and trade associations geared toward luxury hotels.^[10]

There are three restaurants on the property – House Without a Key, Orchids, and La Mer. It is also the home of SpaHalekulani and the Lewers Lounge.

Halekūlani hired luxury hospitality executive Peter Shaindlin as COO in 2003.^[11][12] He has overseen continual improvements to the brand, as well as construction of the Halekūlani Okinawa hotel, on Okinawa Island, Japan, in 2019.^[13][14] Additionally, the corporation acquired the boutique Waikiki Parc hotel across the street, and has rebranded it as Halepuna Hotel Waikiki.^[15]

Mitsui also owns the Imperial Hotel group in Japan and their half-dozen properties serve as hotel partners to the Halekūlani properties in Hawaii and Okinawa.^[16]

• The swimming pool's bottom is covered in 1.2 million South African glass mosaic tiles that form a distinctive design in the shape of a Cattleya orchid.^[17]
• A century-old Kiawe tree in the outside area of House Without a Key
• Mahiole (Feathered helmet), a pair of 1983 stone sculptures by Charles W. Watson