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THE HOTEL METROPOLE MONTE-CARLO IS A TEMPLE OF LIVELY LUXURY AND FADI BOUSTANY ' S LABOR OF LOVE .
By BARBARA BOHN , MANAGING EDITOR
There is no place in the world like Monaco . The prosperous principality , independent for most of the past 600 years , squeezes 125 nationalities on 487 acres between France and the Côte d ’ Azur . It is a real-life movie set for the cosmopolitan and the ultra-rich .
The 126-room Hotel Metropole Monte- Carlo is the only such freehold property in Monaco . Inside its 19th-century walls , names at the pinnacle of luxury — Givenchy , Lagerfeld , Robuchon — have created one-ofa-kind spaces , services and experiences . If it were a movie , Audrey Hepburn would be the star . There is no place like it in the world . That ' s exactly how Fadi Boustany wants it . His father , Nabil Boustany , built his fortune in luxury real estate in Lebanon , Canada and the Middle East , purchasing the hotel in 1980 . Boustany himself was born in Lebanon but raised mostly in Switzerland , and he was in his 20s when he and his brother , Magid , took over the Metropole . His only previous hotel experience was as a guest .
If the name doesn ' t sound familiar , Boustany prefers it that way , too . " It ' s a very discreet family , extremely smart , wise , with a clear vision of what they want to achieve ," says hotel GM Serge Ethuin .
INTENTION AND RESULTS “ Everything is so intentional ,” says luxury experience consultant David Richey , a longtime friend of Boustany ’ s . “ The hotel as it exists today is entirely Fadi .”
Meeting in offices next to the hotel , Boustany is casually dressed and seated in a conference room flanked by historic photos and two scale models under glass : one of the hotel , in gold , and another of the Couronne , a 16th-century French warship — a gift to his father from Mr . Onassis , he
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