Graduate by Hilton Providence | |
---|---|
General information | |
Type | Hotel |
Location | 11 Dorrance Street, Providence, Rhode Island 02903, United States |
Completed | June 6, 1922 |
Height | |
Roof | 220 ft (67 m) |
Technical details | |
Floor count | 18 |
Design and construction | |
Architect(s) | Warren & Wetmore |
Other information | |
Number of rooms | 294 [1] |
Providence-Biltmore Hotel | |
Location | Providence, Rhode Island |
Coordinates | 41°49′27″N71°24′49″W / 41.82417°N 71.41361°W |
Built | 1922 |
Architect | Warren & Wetmore |
Architectural style | Federal, Beaux Arts |
Part of | Downtown Providence Historic District (ID84001967) |
NRHP reference No. | 77000005 [2] |
Significant dates | |
Added to NRHP | May 27, 1977 |
Designated CP | February 10, 1984 |
The Graduate by Hilton Providence is an upscale hotel that opened in 1922 as the Providence Biltmore Hotel, part of the Bowman-Biltmore Hotels chain. It is located on the southern corner of Kennedy Plaza at 11 Dorrance Street in downtown Providence, Rhode Island. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1977 and is a member of Historic Hotels of America, the official program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. [3]
The Providence Biltmore was conceived by the Providence Chamber of Commerce and funded through a public campaign in which 1,800 citizens contributed to pay for the construction costs. The management contract for the hotel was awarded to the Bowman-Biltmore Hotels chain, founded by John McEntee Bowman and Louis Wallick. The hotel was built in the neo-Federal Beaux-arts style and designed by the architectural firm of Warren and Wetmore, who also designed Grand Central Terminal. The hotel opened to much fanfare on June 6, 1922, [4] and was the second-tallest building in the city after the Rhode Island State House, until the Industrial Trust Tower was finished six years later. [5] Today, the Biltmore is the 9th-tallest building in the city.
The Biltmore was the city's only luxury hotel and welcomed many famous (and infamous) guests over the course of the 20th century. Mobsters, bootleggers, celebrities and politicians frequented the hotel and its many restaurants and bars. The hotel was the backdrop for many Rhode Island political and social scandals over the years, many of which are documented in the book Meet Me At The Biltmore.
The Biltmore welcomed both black and white guests during a time when racial discrimination in public accommodations was common. [6] Starting in 1941, the hotel paid for a listing in The Negro Motorist Green Book, a travel guide for Black travelers. [6]
The Biltmore was bought by Sheraton Hotels in 1947 and renamed the Sheraton-Biltmore Hotel. Providence was flooded by Hurricane Carol in 1954, leaving much of the hotel's lobby underwater; a plaque commemorates the high water mark today, eight feet up on the lobby columns. [7] Sheraton sold the hotel, along with seventeen other aging properties, to Gotham Hotels in 1968 and it became the Biltmore Hotel & Motor Inn. In 1975, amidst a flurry of lawsuits over tens of thousands of dollars of unpaid utility bills and back taxes, Gotham Hotels was forced to close the Biltmore. It remained vacant for four years. [8]
With the hotel facing demolition; Mayor Buddy Cianci helped with efforts to designate the hotel a landmark. [9] A group of local businessmen, including Bruce Sundlun of the Outlet Company, Michael Metcalf of The Providence Journal, G. William Miller of Textron, and Jim Winoker and Dominic Zinni of B.B. Greenberg Company, purchased the hotel. They used Federal tax credits to restore the hotel, reopening it in February 1979 as The Biltmore Plaza, operated by Boston hospitality management firm Hotels of Distinction. [10] The Biltmore's external glass elevator was added during this renovation, and served all 18 floors of the hotel (though it no longer runs). In 1983, the owners retained Dunfey Hotels to manage the hotel, which was renamed Biltmore Plaza, A Dunfey Hotel. [11] Soon after, Dunfey was reorganized as Omni Hotels, and the hotel was renamed the Omni Biltmore Hotel. By the 1990s, the Omni Biltmore was fully owned by The Providence Journal. [12] They sold the hotel to the Grand Heritage Hotels chain in July 1995, for $7 million, [13] and it was renamed the Providence Biltmore. The hotel was sold out of receivership on May 31, 2012 to Finard Coventry Hotel Management, for $16 million. [14] Finard Coventry invested a further $10 million in renovations, [15] and the hotel joined Curio, A Collection by Hilton, on December 16, 2014. [16]
In October 2017, the Biltmore was sold to AJ Capital Partners, a Chicago-based hotel and real estate firm, for $43.6 million. [17] The hotel was renovated and renamed Graduate Providence on April 2, 2019, [18] as part of AJ Capital's Graduate Hotels boutique chain, located in college towns across the United States. [1] The new owners retained the hotel's iconic neon "Biltmore" sign. [17] Hilton Worldwide bought the Graduate Hotels brand in May 2024, and operates the hotel as Graduate by Hilton Providence. However, the Graduate Hotels structures are still owned by AJ Capital Partners. [19]
The hotel was originally built with 600 rooms; later, walls were knocked down and suites were created. It now offers 292 guest rooms.
The hotel contains banquet space of over 19,000 square feet (1,800 m2). The rooftop level Grand Ballroom offers expansive views of the city and Kennedy Plaza and can hold up to 750 guests; its event space is designed for functions such as wedding receptions, banquet service, and conferences.
It was the tallest and largest hotel in Providence for 71 years, until The Westin Providence (today known as the Omni Providence Hotel) was completed in 1993. The hotel was home to the largest Starbucks in New England from 2003-2019. [20]
The Providence Biltmore features prominently in the 2004 Jeff Nathanson film The Last Shot , and the 2007 Anne Fletcher film 27 Dresses .
Showtime episodes of Brotherhood from 2004 to 2007 were also shot here.
In 2022, author Amanda Quay Blount published Meet Me At The Biltmore, [21] a book chronicling the hotel's storied past alongside Providence's highs and lows throughout the 20th century. [22]
The Hotel is the scene of a Brown University collegiate reunion in The Devil Wears Prada by Lauren Weisberger. It is also mentioned a number of times in Jeffrey Eugenides' book The Marriage Plot , which takes place at Brown in 1982.
The Providence Hotel is shown as a scene in NOS4A2, The Hourglass (S2, E6), series on AMC. Air Date: July 26, 2020
Providence Place is an American shopping mall in Providence, Rhode Island. With 1,400,000 sq ft (130,000 m2) of gross leasable area, it has been the largest shopping mall in Rhode Island since it opened in 1999. As of 2022, the mall is anchored by Macy's and Boscov's, and features premier brands such as Abercrombie & Fitch, Adore Me, J.Crew, Brooks Brothers, Tiffany & Co., and Free People.
Bowman-Biltmore Hotels was a hotel chain created by the hotel magnate John McEntee Bowman.
Biltmore may refer to:
The Biltmore Los Angeles is a historic hotel opened in 1923 and located opposite Pershing Square in Downtown Los Angeles, California. The hotel has 70,000 square feet (6,500 m2) of meeting and banquet space. Built with 1500 guestrooms, it now has 683.
The Hilton Boston Park Plaza is a historic hotel in Boston, Massachusetts, United States, opened on March 10, 1927. It was built by hotelier E.M. Statler as part of his Statler Hotels chain. A prototype of the grand American hotel, it was called a "city within a city" and also contains an adjoining office building. It was the first hotel in the world to offer in-room radio in every room.
Loews Hotels is an American luxury hospitality company that owns or operates 26 hotels in the United States and Canada. Loews' hotels and resorts are located in major North American city centers and resort destinations.
The Belleview-Biltmore Resort and Spa was a historic resort hotel located at 25 Belleview Boulevard in the town of Belleair, Florida, United States. The 350,000 square feet (33,000 m2) hotel structure was the last remaining grand historic hotel of its period in Florida that existed as a resort, and the only Henry Plant hotel still in operation when it closed in 2009. The building was noted for its architectural features, with its green sloped roof and white wood-sided exterior, and handcrafted woodwork and Tiffany glass inside. Constructed of native Florida heart pine wood, it was the second-largest occupied wooden structure in the United States after 1938; only the Hotel Del Coronado in San Diego was larger.
The Park Central Hotel is a 25-story, 761-room hotel located southwest of Carnegie Hall at 870 7th Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. It was designed in the Renaissance Revival style and opened on June 12, 1927. The Park Central is an independent hotel managed by Highgate Holdings.
The Rhode Island Convention Center is an exposition center in downtown Providence, RI. Opened in 1993, it is the largest convention center in Rhode Island, with about 130,000 square feet (12,000 m2) of exhibition space, including a 100,000-square-foot (9,300 m2) exhibit hall. It is connected by skybridges to the Amica Mutual Pavilion, and the adjacent Omni Hotels Omni Providence Hotel. The ground level features a main exhibition hall with 100,000 square feet, and the upper level has a ballroom and meeting halls. The building has a five-story glass front with a large space outside the meeting rooms and exhibit halls where visitors can gather and mingle. The center is operated by the Rhode Island Convention Center Authority, which also operates the Amica Mutual Pavilion and Veterans Memorial Auditorium.
Vivo Living Baltimore is an apartment complex located in a twin-tower former high-rise hotel in Baltimore, Maryland. It opened in 2023, while the hotel opened in 1967.
The Atlanta Biltmore Hotel and Biltmore Apartments is a historic building located in Atlanta, Georgia. The complex, originally consisting of a hotel and apartments, was developed by William Candler, son of Coca-Cola executive Asa Candler, with Holland Ball Judkins and John McEntee Bowman. The original hotel building was converted to an office building in 1999. The building is currently owned by the Georgia Institute of Technology and is adjacent to Technology Square.
The Dayton Biltmore Hotel is a historic former hotel built in 1929 and located at the junction of First and Main Streets in downtown Dayton, Ohio, United States. It was converted to senior citizen housing in 1981 and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1982. In 2020, it was acquired by Related Companies, which purchased the property from Aimco.
Omni Hotels & Resorts is an American privately held, international hotel company based in Dallas, Texas. The company was founded in 1958 as Dunfey Hotels, and operates 51 properties in the United States and Canada, totaling over 20,010 rooms and employing more than 23,000 people.
The Jefferson Arms is a historic building in downtown St. Louis, Missouri. It opened as the Hotel Jefferson in 1904 to serve visitors to the Louisiana Purchase Exposition and was named in honor of Thomas Jefferson.
The Hotel Cleveland is a historic hotel on Public Square in Cleveland, Ohio, opened in 1918. It is today part of the Tower City Center mixed-use complex.
Katara Hospitality, formerly known as Qatar National Hotels Company, is the largest hotel owner, developer and operator in Qatar. It is government-owned. As of 2016, the company owns properties in Qatar, Egypt, Morocco, the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Singapore, the Netherlands, the United States, Switzerland, Spain and Thailand. The company has a portfolio of 40 hotels in mid-2019.
Historic Hotels of America is a program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation that was founded in 1989 with 32 charter members; the program accepts nominations and identifies hotels in the United States that have maintained their authenticity, sense of place, and architectural integrity.
The Omni Berkshire Place hotel is located at 21 East 52nd Street, near Madison Avenue, in Midtown Manhattan in New York City. It is owned and operated by Omni Hotels & Resorts. The hotel was also inducted into Historic Hotels of America, the official program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, in 2010.
The Ambassador Chicago, known for many decades as the Ambassador East, is a historic hotel in Chicago, established in 1926. In their heyday, both the hotel and its iconic restaurant, The Pump Room, were frequented by celebrities.
The hotel had an open occupancy policy, accepting both black and white guests. But it took a step further by actually paying for a listing in the Green Book. Beginning in 1941, it simply reads, "Biltmore" under the heading "Providence."
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)