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1675-5 Fontainebleau Ir 2 of 8, 21 Terms mh TIME HUMBLES ART DECO LADY, BUT SHE STILL STANDS TALL 06/21/1997 THE MIAMI HERALD Copyright (c) 1997, The Miami Herald DATE: Saturday, June 21, 1997 EDITION: Final SECTION: Living PAGE: 1G LENGTH: 148 lines ILLUSTRATION: color photo: La Normandie fountain display at the Fontainebleau Hilton; photo: La Normandie fountain display at the Fontainebleau Hilton (a) SOURCE/CREDIT LINE: DIANE KOLYER Herald Staff Writer MEMO: see ROAD MAP and WHERE ARE THEY NOW? and coming Sunday at end TIME HUMBLES ART DECO LADY, BUT SHE STILL STANDS TALL Miami Beach, capital of Art Deco, has one treasure few people ever see: a bronze French maiden, draped like the goddess Athena -- but with a 1930s hairdo. She is the only major sculpture from the dazzling French luxury liner Normandie in the United States outside of New York. And she has quite a past. She once stood at the top of the grand staircase of the Normandie, the largest and fastest ocean liner of 1935. At her feet, industrialists networked over brandy and cigars. On the French liner, princes and celebrities ate in a dining room longer than the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles, lounged in custom-woven Aubusson-upholstered chairs, exchanged bon mots under chandeliers by Lalique. Today the bronze maiden -- La Normandie she's called -- has a humbler life: She stands between two potted palms in a remote lobby in the Fontainebleau Hilton's spa building, presiding over bellhops pushing luggage carts and guests rustling past with beach bags. No one stops to read the little plaque that tells her story. And that's a shame, says Morris Lapidus, the 94-year-old architect of the Fontainebleau who saved the statue from the scrap heap in 1954. "It certainly doesn't deserve to be in a little hotel lobby. It belongs in a museum. " Her last voyage The bronze maiden's shift of fate began when the Normandie docked at Pier 88 in New York on Aug. 28, 1939. World War II was four days away. The luxury liner never sailed again. La Normandie and the other Art Deco treasures were removed in 1941 before work began to convert the vessel into a troop transport. A fire a month later put an end to that plan. In 1946 the hulk was towed across the Hudson River to New Jersey, where the $60 million ocean liner was reduced to $161,000 worth of scrap metal. Thousands of newspaper and magazine articles and several books have told the ship's sad story. Yet no one seems to know where the huge -- 7-foot-8-inch, 1,000-pound -- statue was for the 13 years before Lapidus found her in 1954. In that year, the Fontainebleau was under construction, already famous for its stunningly curved shape. The lobby was nearing completion, and Lapidus went shopping in New York with $100, 000 the hotel owners had allocated for decorative objects. Among other things, he was looking for a large statue for a fountain between the pool deck and formal gardens. Someone told him about the big bronze from the Normandie that was at a Manhattan scrap yard. The statue was just what Lapidus wanted. He paid only for the value of the metal, which the scrap dealer quoted after weighing it: "He said, '$1,200, ' and I said, 'You've got a deal. ' I just bought it; I didn't know what I had. " What he had was one of three major statues commissioned for the Normandie. This one was by Art Deco sculptor Leon-Georges Baudry, whose name is cut deeply into La Normandie 's base in block letters. Lapidus said he never noticed the name. "I did not see that. As a matter of fact, I've never seen it. " Bronze lady gets a new home Lapidus shipped the statue to Miami Beach in a tractor-trailer with other decorative objects he had bought for the hotel. La Normandie took her place of honor high above the gardens, and stayed for more than 20 years. In the late '70s, she was moved into the main lobby, first to the Gigi Room, later called the Dining Galleries, and then to the Tropigala Club. Lisa Cole, the hotel's public relations director, said that in 1995, the statue was moved to the guest lobby of the spa building and the building renamed "Normandie. " The little lobby was redone in an Art Deco motif to complement the statue. "I think it's a very nice place for it, " Cole said. Art Deco aficionados and ocean liner experts hive mixed feelings. "After a couple of visits to the Fontainebleau, I was able to actually find the statue, " said Ben Olson of Milwaukee, an ocean liner fan who travels to South Florida regularly on business. "She seems quite out of place in the small lobby, but it is quiet and a great place for reflection on her once-great home. " John Christie, an English professor at Indiana State University and a ship fan who has done extensive research on La Normandie, says the statue has a problem: It's "hotel art. " "It's not what you would call a great piece of art, " he said. "Knowledgeable people would say she's mannish, and people at the hotel make fun of her big feet. " Christie thinks the Fontainebleau ownership has done its best to find a proper setting for La Normandie, but it's hard. "They've tried to do honorably by creating the special Art Deco lobby. They've tried other places, but those places just didn't work. It's a big statue. " A part of history What, then, is to become of her? Will La Normandie stay in her remote lobby, or perhaps be sold? Artifacts relating to the star-crossed ship are much in demand. At an ocean liner memorabilia sale last November in New York, Christie's East auction house sold a pair of needlepoint side chairs from the Normandie's grand salon for $12,650 and two gilt-bronze plaques from the first-class dining room for $11,500 each. Items do not even have to have been on the ship -- any connection is worth money: An advertising poster for the ship -- a 1935 lithograph by Adolphe Cassandre -- went for $12,650. Cole said a Christie's representative once told her that La Normandie could bring $250,000 to $500,000 at auction. The statue was insured for $1 million while on loan to the Bass Museum during a 1993 exhibit. But Fontainebleau owner Steven Muss said La Normandie is not for sale. "The statue is a part of the history of the hotel, " he said. "It is history. It is art history, " Lapidus said. "It is not serving any purpose where it is. It should be in a museum. It would be a very generous thing for Steve Muss to choose one, to designate where it should go. When I see him, I'll tell him. " ROAD MAP Want to visit La Normandie ? The directions: Enter the main lobby of the Fontainebleau Hilton at 4441 Collins Ave., Miami Beach, and take the escalator to the basement. Continue in this direction to the automatic doors leading outside. Turn right at the sign to the Spa/Health Club, go past the tennis courts, up the ramp and into the lobby. The statue can't be missed. The same lobby can be approached from the Normandie Building's street entrance at 4391 Collins Ave. The awning announces the Fontainebleau Hilton Spa, and a sign says "Members Only, " but the door is open. At the circular reception desk, turn left, go up several steps and walk to the other end of the hall to the hotel annex's lobby. WHERE ARE THEY NOW? La Normandie was one of three large sculptures commissioned for the Normandie by Compagnie Generale Transatlantique -- the French Line. La Paix (Peace) , which towered over diners in the first-class dining room at 18 feet, including the base, found its final resting place in the "Garden of Normandie" at Pinelawn Memorial Park, a Long Island, N.Y., cemetery. The third piece, called Neptune, was supposed to be the highlight of the Normandie's aft promenade. However, the enormous piece was too heavy for the ship. Instead, it became the centerpiece for the port of Le Havre, France, where it greets English Channel ferries and an occasional cruise ship. living COMING SUNDAY Morris Lapidus was one of the foremost architects of the '50s. This, we know. He made design history with the Fontainebleau. This, we know. Now 94, he lives in Miami Beach. This, we know. What we don't know is: What's his pad like? Find out Sunday when the Home section brings you At Home With . . . Morris Lapidus. cutlines Fontainebleau Hilton HOME WITH A VIEW: For 20 years, La Normandie stood in a fountain display between the pool deck and formal gardens at the Fontainebleau Hilton, the site Morris Lapidus intended as the statue's home. FRANK BRAYNARD JR. / Picture History of the Normandie MARICE COHN BAND / Herald Staff STANDING WATCH: In her past life, La Normandie , at left, overlooked the grand staircase of the Normandie ocean liner. Right, La Normandie now occupies a spot in the lobby of the spa at the Fontainebleau Hilton in Miami Beach. Credit for picture at left TAG: 9706240064 4 of 8, 44 Terms 4