Balazs is the hotelier behind a handful of boutique properties, including the Mercer, Chateau Marmont, and The Standard chain of hotels.

The son of Hungarian academics, Balazs grew up in Cambridge and went to college at Cornell, demonstrating an early interest in the nightlife trade when he launched a publication for Ithaca-area rock shows. After teaming up with his father to start a biotech company called Biomatrix, their discovery—a treatment for osteoarthritis—gave Balazs the capital to pursue a career closer to his heart, and in 1988 he started up the club M.K. with Eric Goode and Serge Becker. In 1990, Balazs debuted his first hotel property, Chateau Marmont, spending $12 million to transform the decaying icon into one of the city's trendiest spots. His first venue in New York was a much more complicated affair. In 1988, he purchased a faded manufacturing facility on Mercer Street and teamed up with designer Campion Platt to convert it into SoHo's first luxury hotel; yet eight years and $32 million later, the hotel was still nowhere near complete. It was only after Balazs enlisted the support of old-hand hoteliers Richard Born and Ira Drukier that the Mercer finally came to fruition, at last opening its Christian Liaigre-designed doors in 1998. Balazs opened the first branch of his quirky Standard Hotel chain in Los Angeles a year later, and he's been expanding with hotels—and, more recently, condos—ever since.

Much like the granddaddy of the boutique hotel, Ian Schrager, Balazs knows how to cultivate a scene, albeit a rarified one. Marc Jacobs stays at the Mercer when he's not in Paris; when Rupert Murdoch needed a place to live several years ago while his SoHo apartment was under construction, he and wife Wendi Deng spent close to a year living in one of the Mercer's suites; and when Russell Crowe famously tossed a phone at a hotel employee, it was a poor Mercer staffer who walked away with the bruises.

The hunky hotelier was previously married to Katie Ford, the daughter of Ford Models founder Eileen Ford. The couple had two daughters, Alessandra and Isabel, before divorcing. It's widely believed that Balazs's 2004 divorce from Ford was precipitated by an affair with Uma Thurman, who became his girlfriend shortly after the split. Balazs and Thurman had a tumultuous relationship—and several practice breakups—before parting for good in early 2007. Post-Uma, he's been linked to comedienne Chelsea Handler. [Image via Getty]