Hotel Openings and Reopenings North and South

The face of the California hotel scene is about to change:

* Hotelier Ian Schrager on Tuesday will unveil his $50-million refurbishment of the 88-year-old Clift Hotel, his first property in San Francisco. He has added 49 rooms to the Clift, for a total of 375.

He also is working on a $25-million redo of the Miramar in Santa Barbara, which he bought in 1998. His hip hotel holdings include West Hollywood’s Mondrian and the Delano in Miami.

Schrager’s favorite designer, Philippe Starck, has put some unique pieces in the landmark Italian Renaissance-style hotel on Geary Street: in the lobby, an 18-foot bronze fireplace mantel by French sculptor Gerard Garouste, and a bronze and marble coffee table by Salvador Dali. Starck left intact the walls of the Art Deco Redwood Room, built in 1933, but added textural touches and violet and gold colors to an otherwise monochromatic scheme. He transformed the Asia de Cuba restaurant from its former Versailles-like look to echo the Redwood Room.

Brochure rates for the hotel range from $325 for a double to $2,025 for a deluxe suite. Contact the Clift, 495 Geary St., San Francisco, CA 94102; telephone (800) 652-5438 or (415) 775-4700, fax (415) 931-7417.

* Just north of Dana Point, the 172-acre St. Regis Beach Resort and Spa, billed as a Tuscan-inspired luxury resort, is scheduled to open Monday. The $240-million, 400-room resort is on the inland side of Pacific Coast Highway near the Monarch Beach Golf Links and the Ritz-Carlton.

St. Regis is promising its guests access to the small, private Monarch Bay beach club and Monarch Beach. But the Monarch Bay homeowners association has filed suit in Orange County Superior Court to prevent access to the club. At press time Tuesday, no trial date had been set.

The St. Regis has a 30,000-square-foot spa with 25 treatment rooms, an 18-hole Robert Trent Jones Jr.-designed golf course, three pools and tennis courts.

Rates start at $425 per night for standard rooms; they will drop to $355 after Sept. 5.

Contact St. Regis Monarch Beach Resort & Spa, 1 Monarch Beach Resort, Dana Point, CA 92629; tel. (888) 627-7219 or (949) 234-3200, fax (949) 234-3333, https://www.stregismonarchbeach.com.

Compiled by Times staff