Red Fox Room reverie

Like other sentimental San Diegans I was disappointed when I learned that the Red Fox Room was being booted from its home in the Lafayette Hotel — a space that it had occupied for half a century. To me, the old Red Fox Room was a beloved time capsule in a city that can’t seem to get rid of its antique features fast enough. And the news that it would be moving across the street didn’t do much to improve my mood. I had little faith in the place’s ability to reincarnate itself in a building that would be some 60 years newer, despite the proprietor’s intention to keep the institution more or less the same.

But I am happy to report that it seems they did what they could. The exterior looks like it was 3-D printed into existence — harsh geometry, chilly, white, and featureless — but inside, the dimly lit, vintage atmosphere remains much as it was before, to the point where the stark transition from the street to the interior is a little surreal. The red banquettes, low ceilings, stained glass, and dark wood are still here. I am still able to enjoy a cocktail while seated next to a full suit of armor standing sentry by the bathroom hallway.

The aged patrons still add to the antique feeling, too: an 80-year-old man in a blazer and orthopedic shoes shuffles to the bar to ask for a toothpick; impromptu vocalists join the piano and saxophone to contribute to the music that still happens nightly at 7:30, choosing their favorite songs from 50 years ago. (“I Believe In Music,” anyone?)

Tonight, I want to take a closer look at the most famous piece in the interior of this place: the mantelpiece that is mentioned on their website and in every story or review that has been written about the Red Fox Room. Today, it stands over a humble artificial fireplace in the dining room. But it hails from an English pub dating back to 1642, and was later the mantelpiece in the Rathskeller room of the 110-room Santa Monica “Ocean House” belonging to film star — and long-time paramour of William Randolph Hearst — Marion Davies. It came to the Red Fox Room with other fixtures from that location after the house was sold, after spending some time in storage, and maybe some time in Point Loma, too. Hailing as it does from Davies and Hearst’s opulent life, the mantelpiece serves as an envoy from a land that Prohibition never touched, a banner under which the petite star schmoozed and awed her guests.

The images on the tripartite mantelpiece are of biblical scenes: (1) Rebecca at the well with Abraham’s servant, revealing through her offer of water both to man and beast that she is destined to be Isaac’s wife; (2) Rebecca covering herself with a veil at the moment she realizes she is in the presence of her future husband; (3) Jacob tricking Esau out of his father’s blessing at his mother Rebecca’s request, after Esau traded his birthright for a meal. The stories, as Red Fox’s website will tell you, are from Genesis 24 and 27. So we’ve got themes of refreshment and hospitality here, of matrimony and family, of trickery and destiny. Good stuff for an inn or a bar, really.

The mantelpiece connects us to so many histories: to a classic San Diego institution, to a legend of the silver screen, to the Gilded Age spoils of Hearst, to a mysterious inn in Surrey from hundreds of years ago, and to the biblical stories that its patrons would probably have been able to identify without the kind of assistance we more modern souls might need. In any case, I’m glad it’s still here.