Coming Up Chic

Almost the only way of telling one Swiss Alp from another is by the celebrities who choose to schuss its slopes by day and carouse, apres-ski, in the little town huddled at its base. If the sporty figure sipping a spot of Pernod at the peak is Aristotle Onassis and the lady sitting it out at the bottom is Elsa Maxwell, then the site is St. Moritz. If the set is peopled by a slightly showier crowd, among them players such as Audrey Hepburn, Mel Ferrer and Deborah Kerr, it is Klosters. And if the Greek fellow is named Stavros Niarchos and the other folk include the King and Queen of Thailand, Jordan's King Hussein and Monaco's Rainier and Grace, then, undoubtedly, the place is Gstaad, and--this year more than ever--it is The Place.

Expensive Lingering. Eight hours by train from Paris and three from Geneva, therefore the most accessible of Switzerland's three top ski resorts, Gstaad prides itself on its "family-like ambiance." The village's popularity may be measured in part by the declining number of hotel rooms; like a horde of men who came to dinner, winter vacationers tend to linger on forever, end up plunking down an average $70,000 for a plot of land and another $50,000 for a chalet to build on it. To some, a year-round retreat there is worth even more: Actress Elizabeth Taylor picked up a little shack in the valley last summer for a cool $346,500.

Visitors who choose to rent instead of build or buy can get away for less ($3,000 for the season), but find themselves dissatisfied. Said one American matron last week, "I just rented a chalet for the season this time, but next year I'm going to take it all year. It's such trouble having to store my ski clothes." In addition to the fulltime chalet dwellers (most of whom maintain at least one other home base, ranging in location and social prestige from the Riviera to Florida), Gstaad harbors a large class of doting parents who, having shipped off their children to nearby prep schools such as Le Rosey and Montesano, like to stick around within visiting distance for a term or two.

The Palace Hotel, where a single with bath can be had for $50 a day, is still the town's toniest hangout; over the past several years, its guests have ranged from high royalty and heads of state (Belgium's Leopold III and son Baudouin, President Felix Houphouet-Boigny of the Ivory Coast, France's Pierre Mendes-France, Italy's Umberto, the Princesses Brigitta of Sweden and Alexandra of Britain) to plain old actors and artists (Joan Crawford, Maurice Chevalier, Louis Armstrong, Ava Gardner, Melina Mercouri, Lionel Hampton and Pablo Casals).

But no matter how impressive the hotel roster, it is the chalet owners around whom most of Gstaad social life is centered; the at-home set includes such long-time residents as the Earl of Warwick, Conductor Efrem Kurtz, Violinist Yehudi Menuhin and Swiss Industrialist Louis Chopard, whose wife Nancy specializes in international parties usually attended by at least one countess. One successful hostess, U.S. Freelance Photographer Nancy Holmes, featured as house guests the Rex Harrisons, who made the night sky shake with a mambo in the snow. There are some 250 chalets dotting the valley in and about the village, and owners are expected to host one big party every ten days or so during High Season (mid-December to mid-March). Shipping Magnate Marcel Wagner complied nicely when his turn came a few weeks ago, threw open his four-story 18th century chalet to 100 carefully selected guests and ferried them to and from the village in a specially hired two-car railroad train.

High Twisting. Because of the eternal servant problem, many chalet parties end up at one of the town's three fine restaurants. Newest nightspot, and wildest by far, is Le Chesery, built last year for $575,000 by the Aga's Uncle Sadruddin Khan. Featuring a Cuban band imported from Montparnasse, the club encourages nightlong twisting, and unlike the rival Palace Hotel requires no necktie. The Gstaad old guard are not quite sure they approve; a group of rich young Greeks recently brawled over a girl at a Chesery party, ended by stripping her to her black lace panties. Far more the Gstaad style is the six-year-old Eagle Club, whose 190 lifetime members pay a subscription fee of $1,000, are guaranteed a place to sit down to eat and a breathtaking view from the 6,000-ft.-high lodge.

Until last week, Gstaad had only one shortcoming: the skiing season ended with the spring thaws in mid-March because none of the 25 lifts reached into the higher regions of eternal snows. But last week Gstaad's 2,000 permanent citizens celebrated the opening of a new 9,000-ft. lift that will keep everybody schussing on the high slopes even through the common people's summer.

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