It seems short-time hotels at Nana Plaza might not be gone forever after all.
Back in April, I reported that the days of taking the girl of your dreams to one of the Nana Plaza short-time hotels were done. Nana Plaza’s landlord told tenants that the hotels – closed since before Covid-19 – would be gutted and short-time rooms forever closed inside the complex.
Not so fast….
Fast-forward six months and – even the tenants who held the Nana Plaza short-time hotels began selling or gutting the short-time rooms – Nana’s general manager disclosed that hotels might return to the plaza after all.
That development left those tenants pulling their hair out as two sold their Nana Plaza short-time hotels and two others have begun turning them into bars.
Nana Plaza Short-Time Hotels Winner
The man who made out the best is, unsurprisingly, Tee, the plaza’s largest tenant and the operational chief for an American investor who is the money behind Tee and the Rainbow, Twister and Bunny bars. (Except for Rainbow 69 now.)
Tee snatched up the spot that was once the short-time hotel next to the Thai kitchen and Tycoon on the top floor. He also took over the old Hollywood Inn, the hotel that was above the closed Balcony Bar. Both are being redeveloped into bars, although not strictly go-go bars.
In the case of the hotel next to Butterflies, the space has been gutted, with all the walls separating rooms removed with plans to open it as a small go-go run by the owner of Butterflies and Billboard.
Next to Tycoon, the stairs that once led up to a short-time hotel now will lead to Lace Lounge, which is nearing the competion of construction.
However, the upper-floor rooms are still there, meaning there’s hope that those could reopen as a short-time spot.
Nana Plaza Short-Time Hotels Closed for Years
Nana Plaza short-time hotels have been closed since before the coronavirus pandemic and were unlikely to reopen this year due to the skittish Lumpini district police. Tenants kept holding out hope that once that chief retired at the end of September, hotels could reopen.
But what happened in Patpong last spring left Nana’s owner worried and, on March 30, informed hotel tenants the decision was made not to reopen the hotels, regardless of the police chief’s status.
The move was significant for a number of reasons. For the owners, it represented a lost investment. Billboard’s boss had sunk considerable money into the hotel next to Butterflies, with marble-tiled walls, new beds and quality showers. Tycoon’s investors bought the bar not just for the go-go, but the anticipated revenue from the steadily busy short-time hotel upstairs.
What else?
- Bar owners want the short-time hotels open because, currently, if a girl leaves the front gates to go up the road to a hotel, she often doesn’t return that night.
- Many guys don’t want to do a 300-meter walk of shame a shabby hotel two or three blocks away, so there are fewer barfines.
In March, Nana Plaza’s landlord acknowledged the complaints but made it clear the subject was not open for negotiation… at least then. How many guys truly are unwilling to take the “walk of shame” up Soi 4? If a girl is hot enough, a guy will walk over hot coals to be with her. As for girls not returning, bars will have to find another way to incentivize the girls to return.
Stickman Bangkok reported last month that the Nana Plaza short-time hotels might reopen “soon”, but then came the arrests of the foreigenrs who ran the big Absolute Angels and Smooci escort websites, an investigation that has expanded since. That has left Nana’s panicky owner again reluctant to expose Nana Plaza to additional risk. So there’s no word when, or if, the hotels ultimately will reopen.
