As the gatekeeper of New York society during a time of rapid industrialization, Mrs. Astor hosted exclusive parties for the old-money elite (attendance was limited to the 400 most influential people, as chosen by Mrs. Astor and her social secretary, Ward McAllister) and was famously frosty toward the Vanderbilts, whose new railway wealth she considered vulgar. I can’t help but wonder what she would have made of the fact that the St. Regis Toronto was originally branded the Trump International Hotel and Tower. A combination of anti-Trump public sentiment and financial problems led to a change of ownership in 2017, and the property underwent an interior design refresh to prepare for its rebranding as a St. Regis property in November 2018.

Gone is the black wall that once dominated the marble-and-mirror-clad lobby; the reception area now flows into the chic, cream- and gold-accented Astor Lounge, where the nightly champagne sabering — a St. Regis tradition — happens. Also new is the 31st-floor restaurant, Louix Louis, which has a turn-of-the-century Paris vibe and a jaw-dropping ceiling mural meant to evoke the feeling of being inside a whisky glass. The Bloody Mary, another St. Regis tradition invented at the Manhattan hotel’s King Cole Bar in 1934, is reimagined here as the Rouge 140, a toast to the more than 140 languages spoken in Toronto.