- 🎾 What it hosts · The Palace Invitational, its own invitational event, ninth edition in late August 2026, in the Madison Avenue courtyard. The announced lineup: Serena Williams, Taylor Fritz, Matteo Berrettini and Caroline Wozniacki.
- 📺 During the fortnight · Daily screenings on a giant screen in the courtyard, a signature cocktail at the Summer Bar, and DJ sets on 2 and 9 September, from 5:00 pm to 8:00 pm.
- 💎 The package · “Game, Set, Sparkle”, 100,000 dollars, from 24 to 31 August, two-night minimum: the Jewel Suite, a 12-carat tennis bracelet worth 62,000 dollars, and four invitations to the Palace Invitational.
- ⚠️ What it is not · The hotel is not an official partner of the US Open. This role has belonged to a competing hotel group since 2019. The Lotte’s tennis page never mentions the tournament’s name.
- 🏛️ The address · 455 Madison Avenue, opposite Saint Patrick’s Cathedral · 909 rooms and suites, including 176 in the Towers, on the top fourteen floors.
- 🗝️ The house · The Villard Houses, built from 1882 to 1886 by McKim, Mead & White, designated a New York City landmark since 1968, topped with a 1980 tower. Owned by the Lotte Group since 2015.
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There is an elegant way to enjoy an event to which one is not invited. While the US Open is being played at Flushing Meadows, a half-hour subway ride away, the Lotte New York Palace is organising its own tennis season in the main courtyard of the Villard Houses on Madison Avenue. An invitational match with circuit names, daily giant-screen screenings, a dedicated cocktail, and a six-figure package. Everything, except the right to write the tournament’s name.
Contents
The tournament’s official partner, it is not
This is the first point to establish, because it is often reported incorrectly. The official hotel partner of the US Open is a major international hotel group, bound to the tournament by a multi-year agreement signed in 2019 and still in effect. The Lotte New York Palace has no such agreement. As for the players, the American federation allocates them two rooms in an official hotel whose name it does not publish, or doubles their daily allowance if they prefer to stay elsewhere.
The most telling proof lies in the hotel’s own vocabulary. Its page dedicated to tennis never utters the words “US Open”. It writes “when championship tennis returns to New York”, “the tournament”, “the tennis season”. This is the language of an establishment that has no right to use the trademark, and which has built an entire programme within that gap.
The Palace Invitational, its own competition
Rather than renting visibility it cannot have, the hotel created its own gathering. The Palace Invitational is in its ninth edition and takes place in late August in the Madison Avenue courtyard, transformed into a court for the occasion. It is not tennis, but pickleball, that shorter and more spectacular cousin, which fits into a hotel courtyard where a real court would not. The announced lineup for 2026 brings together Serena Williams, Taylor Fritz, Matteo Berrettini, and Caroline Wozniacki.
The hotel speaks of “past participations” for these players, not stays. No source documents that a tour player stays at the property during the tournament, and the house claims this nowhere. The distinction may seem minor, but it is not: it separates a marketing partnership from an unverified claim.
| Rooms and suites | 909, including 176 in the Towers |
| Address | 455 Madison Avenue, on the corner of 50th Street |
| Villard Houses | construction from 1882 to 1886 · McKim, Mead & White |
| New York City landmark | designated on 30 September 1968 |
| The tower | construction launched on 14 March 1978 · Emery Roth & Sons |
| Hotel opening | 15 September 1980, under the name Helmsley Palace |
| Owner | Lotte Group since 28 August 2015, for 805 million dollars |
| Latest renovation | 140 million dollars, completed in autumn 2013 |
One hundred thousand dollars for two nights and a bracelet
The tennis programme also had a high-end version. The “Game, Set, Sparkle” package, offered from 24 to 31 August for 100,000 dollars with a two-night minimum, brought together the Jewel Suite, a twelve-carat tennis bracelet valued at 62,000 dollars, four invitations to the Palace Invitational, and a meeting with the athletes. The offer has since disappeared from the hotel’s packages page, suggesting it has found a taker or has reached its end.
For other guests, the fortnight is experienced in the courtyard. The hotel installs a giant screen, serves a cocktail inspired by the tournament’s, and programs two DJ sets on 2 and 9 September, from 5:00 pm to 8:00 pm. It is a low-cost way to bring the event to life on-site, without purchasing a single right.
An 1886 landmark beneath a 1980 tower
The hotel owes its silhouette to a rare superposition. The Villard Houses, commissioned by rail tycoon Henry Villard, were built between 1882 and 1886 by the firm McKim, Mead & White, modeled after Italian Renaissance palazzos. Six townhouses arranged in a U-shape around an open courtyard on Madison Avenue, in brownstone, right opposite Saint Patrick’s Cathedral. The city designated them a landmark on 30 September 1968, and they have been listed on the National Register since 1975.
In 1978, a bronze-glass tower designed by Emery Roth & Sons rose behind these facades, preserved by their landmark status. The hotel opened on 15 September 1980 under the name Helmsley Palace, before passing through the hands of the Sultan of Brunei, then an investment fund, and finally the Korean Lotte Group, which bought it for 805 million dollars in 2015. A 140 million-dollar renovation, completed in 2013, redesigned the rooms and public areas. The spa now occupies some 650 square metres on the seventh floor, featuring seven treatment rooms and a direct view of the cathedral.
Our perspective
What the Lotte New York Palace is doing is more interesting than a partnership. Buying the status of official Grand Slam hotel is expensive and gets diluted in the mass of sponsors; building your own gathering, in a courtyard that no one else possesses opposite Saint Patrick’s Cathedral, produces images that the tournament cannot provide. The gamble has its limits: without the rights, the hotel can neither name the event nor claim to host the players, and must rely each year on the availability of a few familiar faces. But it single-handedly occupies a ground that its Midtown competitors have left vacant, and it has been doing so for nine years.
Practical information
- Lotte New York Palace · 455 Madison Avenue, New York · lottenypalace.com
- US Open 2026 is played at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows · main draw from 30 August to 13 September
- Access · Fifth Avenue-53rd Street E and M subway station, a five-minute walk away
