La Belle Creole was a long time dream of Claudius Charles Philippe, the once general manager of the famous Waldorf-Astoria and a man obsessed with luxury, who had a vision of building a little French hideaway on a French St. Martin peninsula. A dream that unfortunately was tangled in a nasty financial web right from the start, when shortly after construction started it ran into money trouble, which eventually halted the project for several years until it was picked up again by other investors.
St. Maarten Abandoned – Part deux
My fascination with urban decay continues with part two of my new photo series, St. Maarten Abandoned.
These photos were all taken on the French side of the island where most of the abandoned buildings are found today. Charming buildings that were once upon a time undoubtedly beautiful jewels in the middle of the center of town, now stand here slowly deteriorating into nothingness yet still somehow maintaining their majestic stature.