The 1931 Art Deco landmark on the Sunset Strip where Bugsy Siegel kept an apartment — now the hotel restaurant — and where Marilyn Monroe, Frank Sinatra, and Howard Hughes all lived at various points
8358 Sunset Blvd, West Hollywood, CA 90069
Research updated June 2026
Age
All Ages
Cost
$$$$
Hotel room rates; restaurant and bar accessible without hotel stay at standard dining prices.
Access
Wheelchair OK
Sunset Strip location with hotel entrance off Sunset Blvd. Elevator access throughout.
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1931 · One of the first Art Deco high-rises on the Sunset Strip (1931) · Tenant roster included Marilyn Monroe, Frank Sinatra, John Wayne, Howard Hughes, Errol Flynn, Truman Capote · Bugsy Siegel kept an apartment here; space now operates as the Tower Bar restaurant · California Historical Landmark
The building at 8358 Sunset Blvd was designed by architect Leland A. Bryant and completed in 1931, representing one of the earliest substantial Art Deco structures on the Sunset Strip. The fifteen-story tower brought residential density to a section of Sunset that was still establishing its character as the entertainment industry's preferred address. Bryant's design features the characteristic vertical ornamentation, stylized relief work, and setback upper floors of mature Art Deco commercial-residential construction.
The building's first decades coincided with Hollywood's golden age, and its tenant roster reflects that proximity: Marilyn Monroe lived here; John Wayne kept a suite; Frank Sinatra, Errol Flynn, and Howard Hughes were among its notable occupants. Truman Capote wrote portions of his work here. The Sunset Tower was not merely adjacent to mid-century Hollywood — it was one of its principal addresses.
Benjamin 'Bugsy' Siegel occupied an apartment in the Sunset Tower in the 1940s. West Hollywood History has documented Siegel's tenancy and the fact that his apartment — now converted and serving as the hotel's Tower Bar restaurant — was a working address for Siegel's activities on the Strip during the period before his move to Las Vegas and the opening of the Flamingo. Siegel was murdered in June 1947 at the Beverly Hills home of Virginia Hill, not at the Sunset Tower; his ghost, in the paranormal accounts, is said to have returned to the Sunset Strip address rather than the murder site.
The hotel has changed ownership and names multiple times since the 1960s, operated variously as the Sunset Tower Apartments and other configurations, before returning to hotel operation as the Sunset Tower Hotel.
Sources
Bugsy Siegel's ghost is the dominant paranormal figure at the Sunset Tower, and his association with the building makes narrative sense: the apartment he occupied for years before his murder is now the building's most-used social space. The Power Traveller's Sunset Boulevard true crime documentation notes the Sunset Tower as one of the Strip's organized-crime haunted addresses, with Siegel as the central figure.
The accounts from the Tower Bar and hotel rooms are not dramatic. Staff and guests describe cold spots in specific locations, particularly in areas corresponding to the upper floor rooms that were part of the Siegel-era configuration. An unidentified male presence — described as a feeling rather than a visual apparition — has been reported in multiple accounts from guests staying on floors associated with the building's earlier Hollywood residential period.
The building's connection to Prohibition-era excess, organized crime, and the specific glamour-and-violence combination that characterized 1940s Hollywood makes it a natural setting for ghost stories. The documented cast of residents — Monroe, Sinatra, Flynn, Hughes, Siegel — each carry their own biography of excess and in some cases violent death or association with violence. The Sunset Tower's paranormal reputation draws on this aggregation rather than on any single incident that occurred within its walls.
Siegel's murder took place at Virginia Hill's Beverly Hills house on June 20, 1947. His return, in ghost lore, to the Sunset Strip address rather than the murder location is consistent with the pattern of ghosts appearing at places of life rather than places of death.
Notable Entities
The Tower Bar restaurant occupies Bugsy Siegel's former apartment space in the Sunset Tower Hotel. Non-guests can dine or drink at the Tower Bar during regular service hours. The hotel's 1931 Art Deco exterior on the Sunset Strip is visible and photographable from the public sidewalk.
Guests can book rooms in the Sunset Tower Hotel to experience the building overnight. The hotel operates as a luxury property; room booking is through the hotel website.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
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Santa Monica, CA
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