Built in 1905 and expanded in 1909–1910 for the Astor family, the hotel occupied a site bounded by Broadway, Shubert Alley, and 44th and 45th Streets.

The Theater District would soon occupy magnificent new auditoriums along Forty-second Street, and electric lighting transformed this strip of Broadway into the "Great White Way".

The Astor set the pattern for "a new species of popular hotels that soon clustered around Times Square, vast amusement palaces that catered to crowds with scenographic interiors that mirrored the theatricality of the Great White Way.

[4] The Large Ballroom (or Banquet Hall), on the ninth floor, opened on September 29, 1909 with a dinner that was part of the Hudson-Fulton Celebration.

Measuring 50 by 85 feet (15 m × 26 m), the Banquet Hall was decorated in the Rococo style of Louis XV and featured a high-groined arch ceiling in ivory white and old gold, supported by grouped caryatids.

A large Austin pipe organ was installed; in 1910 Leo B. Riggs was appointed organist and gave daily concerts for the hotel's guests.

Blue lighting, hanging lamps draped in vines, swaying fern baskets, and scenic pictures of the out-of-doors further enhanced the perception.

[3] In later years, the noted landscape architect Takeo Shiota redesigned the roof's North Garden on a Japanese theme.

[6] Artwork in the original lobby included four murals by William de Leftwich Dodge depicting Ancient and Modern New York.

The ballroom held a marble group called the Three Graces, by sculptor Isidore Konti, with all three figures modeled on Audrey Munson, along with murals by designer Edward G. Unitt.

In 1947, stuntman John Ciampa scaled the exterior of the hotel as part of a publicity ploy for the Sunbrock Rodeo and Thrill Circus.