“Oh my god, it’s so iconic,” Karlie Kloss said of stepping into Chateau Marmont on Thursday night, where Estée Lauder had taken over the hotel’s first floor during Grammys week, transforming it into a playful, immersive celebration of beauty.
Guests ascended the familiar staircase to the lobby, greeted immediately with margaritas and virgin palomas. Just beyond, a bellman stood at attention, offering keys to suite 10.
“Checking in?” he smiled.
Hooked onto each key was a note reading, “FEEL FREE TO DISTURB.”
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“This is such a cute concept. I love it,” said Nia Long, watching the bellman from a makeup chair.
The lobby doubled as a beauty studio, where guests were shade-matched for Estée Lauder’s reformulated Double Wear Stay-In-Place Foundation — the occasion for the celebration. Updated for the first time since 1997, the new version promises 36-hour wear, enhanced skin care benefits and offers 57 shades.
Long is one of the brand’s ambassadors, alongside Kloss, Imaan Hammam, Carolyn Murphy, Paulina Porizkova, Liya Kebede, Bianca Brandolini and newly announced global ambassador Daisy Edgar-Jones.
Further into the lobby, guests clustered around wooden and carpeted phone booths outfitted with black rotary-style phones, taking turns posing as if mid-call. Friends crowded in close, snapping photos on their phones as each picked up the receiver.
“Estée Lauder has always represented confidence and individuality,” said Edgar-Jones, standing nearby. “My earliest memory of the brand is my mom putting on Advanced Night Repair before bed every night. For me, that felt so iconic. And when I bought my first one myself, I felt like, ‘Wow, I’m a woman now.’”
As for Double Wear, her loyalty is practical: “I often leave the house for hours on end and never have time to come home and retouch everything. I’m a very low-maintenance person — I need it to last.”
For Hammam, the night was both celebratory and personal. “I am the first Moroccan-Egyptian, Muslim girl to be the face of Estée Lauder,” she said. “That’s a huge dream. We’re all representing different generations, and that’s what makes this brand feel like it’s truly for everyone.”
Kloss echoed the sentiment, pointing to both the brand’s legacy and evolution.
“Estée herself was such a trailblazer,” she said. “She built an entire industry, and what I love is that the brand continues to evolve with women, how we live, how we move, how we wear makeup now. Double Wear is still iconic, but it’s lighter, more flexible, more modern. It feels like it’s growing with us.”
Kloss had already made her way through suite 10, taking in the details.
“Every room I walk into, I’m blown away by the imagination,” she said. “There are so many unexpected little surprises behind every corner.”
Down the hall, guests entered a mirrored photo studio where reflections multiplied and the word “More” — a visual mantra for the new launch — appeared again and again. A second hallway nodded to the brand’s history, lined with books dedicated to Estée Lauder, one left open to her words: “Going to wonderful parties is a celebration. But having a wonderful party is a gift you give to friends.”
Cocktails were crafted in a kitchen next door, leading guests into two additional rooms designed for play, offering more photo ops alongside oversized Estée Lauder–branded Jenga and Connect Four games, as well as a pool table stamped once again with “More.”
At 10 p.m., two hours into the party, a red velvet curtain that had quietly teased guests all night was finally pulled back, revealing a disco ball-lit dance floor.
“Estée herself would have loved this,” Kloss said.
