By DONALD WITTKOWSKI
It opened in 1923 with Jazz Age glamour – a gleaming white edifice that towered over the Boardwalk and symbolized Ocean City’s rise as a powerhouse seashore tourist destination.
In an instant, the luxurious, nine-story Flanders Hotel at 11th Street and Ocean Avenue transformed both the city’s skyline and tourism market while being proclaimed as the “Jewel of the Southern New Jersey Shore.”
On Wednesday, representatives of the Flanders, political leaders and other dignitaries held a ceremonial ribbon-cutting to celebrate the hotel’s 100th anniversary – as well as its survival amid decades-long economic upheaval and ownership turmoil that culminated in its temporary closure in 1995.
“This is a landmark. It’s an anchor on the Boardwalk. It’s an anchor in Ocean City,” Mayor Jay Gillian said. “Nothing gets done in Ocean City without coming through the Flanders. Over 100 years, how many things have been done here? I think every organization has been here. There are so many people, so many weddings. This is a place that just keeps on going, which is a testament to the ownership.”
The ceremony also included the presentation of state and congressional proclamations to Flanders board president Peter Voudouris by Assemblyman Antwan McClellan and by Cape May County Commissioner Bob Barr on behalf of U.S. Rep. Jeff Van Drew. McClellan and Barr are both former Ocean City councilman.
“This is personal to me,” McClellan said while noting that he and his wife, Angela, celebrated their wedding at the Flanders.
“My family reunion was here. My mom used to work here,” he continued. “It’s a beautiful building. All my family loves to stay here. I love to stay here, even though I’m a couple blocks around the way. We look forward to a hundred more years.”
Michele Gillian, the mayor’s wife and executive director of the Ocean City Regional Chamber of Commerce, also spoke of her fond memories and personal connection to the Flanders over the years.
“I had a brother and sister get married here. We’ve had so many celebrations with the Chamber of Commerce. We can’t thank you enough for all that the Flanders does for Ocean City,” she told Voudouris.
“It’s a landmark. It’s one of the most famous landmarks in Ocean City. We have the beach, we have the Boardwalk, we have the bay and we have the Ocean City Flanders,” she added.
The ribbon-cutting ceremony served to stir up excitement and publicity for a grand centennial celebration at the Flanders scheduled for the night of Nov. 18. Already, 300 out of a total of 500 tickets have been sold for the gala.
Vintage cars from the 1920s will line the street in front of the Flanders as part of the glamorous, throwback-style centennial celebration, Voudouris said.
“It’s going to be something like Ocean City has never seen,” he promised. “It’s going to create memories for generations to come as the Flanders begins to celebrate the next 100 years.”
Built at a cost of $1.5 million, the Flanders was Ocean City’s biggest private construction project at that time when it opened on July 23, 1923, during the exuberant Jazz Age era.
It was named in honor of the Allied troops who fought and died at Flanders Field, the scene of shocking death and destruction in Belgium during World War I.
The upscale 232-room resort hotel was conceived by the town’s business and political leaders as a way to transform Ocean City into a major player in the Jersey Shore’s tourism industry. Over the years, its tony surroundings attracted not only a steady flow of tourists, but also celebrity guests that included Jimmy Stewart and Grace Kelly, among others.
The hotel’s early years, though, were not without challenges. Only six years after the Flanders opened, the stock market crash of 1929 triggered the Great Depression. The Flanders also survived Ocean City’s catastrophic Boardwalk fire in 1927.
After its halcyon days, the hotel began to struggle with the evolving tastes of contemporary vacationers, multiple bankruptcies, the crippling expense of maintaining an aging infrastructure, legal battles and a change in ownership in the mid-1990s.
“It’s been a challenge, a battle, to get here today,” Voudouris acknowledged of the hotel’s tumultuous history.
At one point, the Flanders fell into foreclosure and was forced to shut down on May 8, 1995. By late 1995, a new owner bought the property and converted the hotel rooms into 95 condominiums.
Although the Flanders’ transformation into a “condotel” had promise, the property was saddled with outdated facilities, structural problems, fire code violations and other liabilities that threatened its existence.
At one point, the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs declared the building as unsafe and wanted to close it down in 2005 unless repairs were made, according to a press release that recounted the hotel’s history.
However, the Flanders began its slow recovery in 2005 after the property came under the collective ownership of the condo owners and Voudouris was appointed president of the condominium association board.
“The only problem was we had no money,” Voudouris recalled of the condo owners taking charge.
Voudouris, though, was successful in securing a $2 million construction loan from Sun National Bank to begin repairing the crumbling infrastructure and adding new amenities. One major moneymaker was the addition of five penthouse suites that currently rent for between $1,200 and $1,400 per night and routinely sell out during the summer tourism season.
The Flanders operates as a hotel, even though the units are condos. Voudouris estimated that the Flanders attracts about 100,000 guests each year in its hotel rooms, banquet facilities, supper club, restaurant, spa, fitness center, retail shops and other amenities.
Without hesitation, Voudouris credited his wife, Arlene, and the Flanders’ team of dedicated employees as the primary reasons why the hotel has not only survived, but also begun to thrive again.
“She has devoted many years to restoring and enhancing the welcoming charm of the Flanders, and her elegant touch is evident in every aspect of the hotel’s physical appearance and in the numerous ongoing popular events she created that have become a proud, integral part of the Flanders tradition,” the Flanders said of Arlene Voudouris in a press release.
During the ribbon-cutting ceremony Wednesday, Arlene said she believes that divine intervention helped the Flanders along the way.
“I would put my hand up to the Lord and say that God had a plan,” she said.
Kim Maguire, a former Flanders condo owner who once served on the association’s board, said the Flanders has also been helped by its fetching architecture and charming atmosphere. Most of the condo owners “were in love” with the Flanders and desperately wanted it to succeed, she said.
“Is anyone going to tear down a beautiful place like this one, where Grace Kelly once danced? No,” Maguire said emphatically in an interview.
