Virgin Hotels Chicago | |
---|---|
Former names | Old Dearborn Bank Building |
Alternative names | 203 North Wabash Avenue 54 East Lake Street |
General information | |
Status | Completed |
Location | 203 North Wabash, Chicago, Illinois |
Coordinates | 41°53′10″N87°37′34″W / 41.8861°N 87.6260°W |
Completed | 1928 |
Owner | Virgin Hotels |
Design and construction | |
Architect(s) | Rapp and Rapp |
Renovating team | |
Architect(s) | Booth Hansen |
Designated | June 4, 2003 |
The Virgin Hotels Chicago (formerly Old Dearborn Bank Building or 203 North Wabash Avenue) is a historic building in the Loop community area of Chicago, Illinois, that has been converted from use as an office building to use as a hotel run via a mobile app-based business model. The 250-room hotel is the first of Richard Branson's Virgin Hotels brand boutique hotels geared toward the female business traveller.
Situated at the intersection of East Lake Street and North Wabash Avenue, [1] the Old Dearborn Bank Building was constructed between 1926 and 1928 with ornate medieval and mythological terra-cotta decoration that was typical of movie palaces that were its contemporaries. The neoclassical architecture designed building is one of only two Rapp and Rapp buildings designed as an office building. [2] [3] Soon after the Old Dearborn Bank opened in 1928, it was acquired and its parent company was liquidated in the United States' Great Depression. [4] The building, which is 27 stories high, [5] was designated a Chicago Landmark on June 4, 2003. [2] The 300-foot (91.4 m) light brown brick building with a steel structure includes 25 floors above ground and two below. [3]
The owners of the building defaulted on a $9 million loan from John Hancock Life Insurance resulting in the acquisition of the loan (and thus the property) for an undisclosed amount by Urban Street Properties LLC in April 2010. The building had been acquired by the previous owners for $9.5 million in 2001. [6]
On October 24, 2011, Virgin Hotels, part of Virgin Group, purchased the building with the aim of opening it as their first hotel in 2013 with approximately 250 rooms. [7] The transaction was an all-cash deal that was valued at about $14 million. [1] [8] The company hired The John Buck Company to renovate the building. [5] [1] The lead architect for the renovation was Booth Hansen. [4] The co-designers for the interior renovation were Rockwell Group Europe and Virgin Hotels' in-house design team. [9] The purchase was part of Virgin Hotels' 2010 business plan to acquire distressed properties in North America cheaply during the property downturn. [10]
The building opened for business as a hotel on January 15, 2015. [11] The renovation took longer than planned due to the building's city landmark status, which required continuing coordination with the Commission on Chicago Landmarks. Original features that were retained include a 1920s oak cigar bar, brass elevator lobby doors and a tiled ceiling. [8] The final layout of 250 rooms includes 40 single-room suites and 2 penthouse suites. [8] All rooms are pet friendly. [12]
Under the auspices of the Commission on Chicago Landmarks, the renovation included brick, window and steel-frame replacement. [4] The focal point of the renovated building is the publicly accessible Commons Club on the second floor, with a contemporary-style bar, a full kitchen, a lounge area, curated books and local memorabilia. At the time of opening, four additional dining options were expected within three months. [8] The area was carved out of a former second-floor banking hall. [4]
The visitors use a mobile app, named Lucy, that the company describes as a "personal comfort assistant". [13] According to Mary Forgione of The Los Angeles Times , the app can order more pillows, handle room service orders, and serve as a remote control for both the television and the hotel's music library. [12] The website also suggests that the app can control room temperature, interface with the chat board, provide local knowledge, and coordinate your messages with hotel staff. [13]
When asked about the operation, Virgin's Richard Branson said "There won’t be hidden charges, and you won’t get charged $10 for a chocolate bar you know you can buy at a store for $2." [14] Branson has stated that the brand is geared toward the female business traveler. [15]
Bloomberg Business's Jennifer Parker noted that the hotel was on the cutting edge of technology upon its opening, but questioned whether the hotel had any gender leanings. She found fault with the gym, toiletries, and delayed spa opening, but enjoyed the social ambiance, the normal retail prices of minibar items (rather than more standard hotel overpricing) and the top notch free Wi-Fi. She found many of the appealing elements of the designed to be dubiously marketed, but appealing nonetheless. [9]
Chicago Tribune's Pulitzer Prize-winning architecture critic, Blair Kamin, praised the incorporation of various wildlife into the decor and numerous elements of the rehab resulting from the alliance of real estate developers and historic preservationists, but made it clear that Virgin Hotels Chicago is not the Four Seasons Hotel Chicago or Ritz-Carlton (Four Seasons). He describes this as a successful recycling of a second-tier historic building. [4]
The Loop is Chicago's central business district and one of the city's 77 municipally recognized community areas. Located at the center of downtown Chicago on the shores of Lake Michigan, it is the second-largest business district in North America after Midtown Manhattan. The headquarters and regional offices of several global and national businesses, retail establishments, restaurants, hotels, and theaters–as well as many of Chicago's most famous attractions–are located in the Loop. The neighborhood also hosts Chicago's City Hall, the seat of Cook County, offices of other levels of government, and several foreign consulates. The intersection of State Street and Madison Street in the Loop is the origin point for the address system on Chicago's street grid.
The Trump International Hotel and Tower is a skyscraper condo-hotel in downtown Chicago, Illinois. The building, named for Donald Trump, was designed by architect Adrian Smith of Skidmore, Owings and Merrill. Bovis Lend Lease built the 100-story structure, which reaches a height of 1,388 feet (423.2 m) including its spire, its roof topping out at 1,171 feet (357 m). It is next to the main branch of the Chicago River, with a view of the entry to Lake Michigan beyond a series of bridges over the river. The building received publicity when the winner of the first season of The Apprentice reality television show, Bill Rancic, chose to manage the construction of the tower over managing a Rancho Palos Verdes–based Trump National Golf Course & Resort in the Los Angeles metro area.
The Magnificent Mile is a section of Michigan Avenue in Chicago devoted to retail, dining, hotels and tourist attractions. Running from the Chicago River to Oak Street in the Near North Side, the district is located one block east of Rush Street and is the main retail corridor between the Loop and Gold Coast. It is bounded by Streeterville neighborhood to its east and River North to its west.
The Chicago Pedway is a network of tunnels, ground-level concourses and bridges in Chicago, Illinois connecting skyscrapers, retail stores, hotels, and train stations throughout the central business district.
330 North Wabash is a skyscraper in downtown Chicago, Illinois, United States, at 330 N. Wabash Avenue, designed by architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. A small bust of the architect by sculptor Marino Marini is displayed in the lobby. The 52-story building is situated on a plaza overlooking the Chicago River. At 695 feet, 330 North Wabash is the second-tallest building by Mies van der Rohe, the tallest being the Toronto-Dominion Bank Tower at Toronto-Dominion Centre. It was his last American building.
The Blackstone Hotel is a historic 290-foot (88 m) 21-story hotel on the corner of Michigan Avenue and Balbo Drive in the Michigan Boulevard Historic District in the Loop community area of Chicago, Illinois. Built between 1908 and 1910, it is on the National Register of Historic Places. The Blackstone is famous for hosting celebrity guests, including numerous U.S. presidents, for which it was known as the "Hotel of Presidents" for much of the 20th century, and for contributing the term "smoke-filled room" to political parlance.
The Sullivan Center, formerly known as the Carson, Pirie, Scott and Company Building or Carson, Pirie, Scott and Company Store, is a commercial building at 1 South State Street at the corner of East Madison Street in Chicago, Illinois. Louis Sullivan designed it for the retail firm Schlesinger & Mayer in 1899 and later expanded it before H.G. Selfridge & Co. purchased the structure in 1904. That firm occupied the structure for only a matter of weeks before it sold the building to Otto Young, who then leased it to Carson Pirie Scott for $7,000 per month, which occupied the building for more than a century until 2006. Subsequent additions were completed by Daniel Burnham in 1906 and Holabird & Root in 1961.
108 North State Street, also known as Block 37, is a development located in the Loop community area of downtown Chicago, Illinois. It is located on the square block bounded clockwise from the North by West Randolph Street, North State Street, West Washington Street and North Dearborn Street that is known as "Block 37", which was its designated number as one of the original 58 blocks of the city. Above-ground redevelopment is complete, but work stopped on an underground station, when the station was only partially complete.
The James M. Nederlander Theatre is a theater located at 24 West Randolph Street in the Loop area of downtown Chicago, Illinois. Previously known as the Oriental Theatre, it opened in 1926 as a deluxe movie palace and vaudeville venue. Today the Nederlander presents live Broadway theater and is operated by Broadway In Chicago, currently seating 2,253.
The Arc at Old Colony is a 17-story landmark building in the Chicago Loop community area of Chicago, Illinois. Designed by the architectural firm Holabird & Roche in 1893–94, it stands at approximately 215 feet and was the tallest building in Chicago at the time it was built. The building was designated a Chicago Landmark on July 7, 1978. It was the first tall building to use a system of internal portal arches as a means of bracing the structure against high winds.
The London Guarantee Building or London Guaranty & Accident Building is a historic 1923 commercial skyscraper whose primary occupant since 2016 is the LondonHouse Chicago Hotel. Formerly, for a time named the Stone Container Building, it is located near the Loop in Chicago, and is one of four historic 1920s skyscrapers that surround the Michigan Avenue Bridge over the Chicago River and is a contributing property to the Michigan–Wacker Historic District. It stands on part of the former site of Fort Dearborn. The building was designated a Chicago Landmark on April 16, 1996.
The Pittsfield Building, is a 38-story skyscraper located at 55 E. Washington Street in the Loop community area of Chicago, Illinois, United States, that was the city's tallest building at the time of its completion. The building was designated as a Chicago Landmark on November 6, 2002.
Loop Retail Historic District is a shopping district within the Chicago Loop community area in Cook County, Illinois, United States. It is bounded by Lake Street to the north, Ida B. Wells Drive to the south, State Street to the west and Wabash Avenue to the east. The district has the highest density of National Historic Landmark, National Register of Historic Places and Chicago Landmark designated buildings in Chicago. It hosts several historic buildings including former department store flagship locations Marshall Field and Company Building, and the Sullivan Center. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on November 27, 1998. It includes 74 contributing buildings and structures, including 13 separately listed Registered Historic Places, and 22 non-contributing buildings. Other significant buildings in the district include the Joffrey Tower, Chicago Theatre, Palmer House, and Page Brothers Building. It also hosts DePaul University's College of Commerce, which includes the Kellstadt Graduate School of Business and the Robert Morris College.
11 South LaSalle Street Building or Eleven South LaSalle Street Building is a Chicago Landmark building that is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and that is located at 11 South LaSalle Street in the Loop community area of Chicago, Illinois, United States. This address is located on the southeast corner of LaSalle and Madison Street in Cook County, Illinois, across the Madison Street from the One North LaSalle Building. The building sits on a site of a former Roanoke building that once served as a National Weather Service Weather Forecast official climate site and replaced Major Block 1 after the Great Chicago Fire. The current building has incorporated the frontage of other buildings east of the original site of Major Block 1.
The Northwest Tower, later popularly known as the Coyote Building, and Robey Hotel since 2017, is a 12-story Art Deco building at the corner of North Avenue and Milwaukee Avenue in Chicago. It was designed by Perkins, Chatten & Hammond and built between 1928 and 1929.
Virgin Hotels is a brand of hotels created by Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Group, launched in 2010.
Virgin Hotels Las Vegas is a hotel and casino resort in Paradise, Nevada, east of the Las Vegas Strip. It previously operated as the Hard Rock Hotel from 1995 to 2020, before closing for renovations to be rebranded as Virgin Hotels.
151 North Franklin is a skyscraper located at 151 North Franklin Avenue in the Chicago Loop. Completed in 2018 and standing at 568 feet tall with 35 floors at the northeast corner of West Randolph Street and North Franklin Avenue, the building is the current corporate headquarters of namesake tenant CNA Insurance, which has been headquartered in the Loop since 1900. It also hosts large office spaces for Facebook and the law firm Hinshaw & Culbertson.
Sentral Michigan Avenue or 808 South Michigan (Avenue) is a 479-unit apartment building on South Michigan Avenue in the Loop community area, Chicago, Illinois. It is connected to Le Méridien Essex Chicago at 800 South Michigan Avenue.
Preservation Chicago is a historic preservation advocacy group in Chicago, Illinois, which formally commenced operations on October 23, 2001. The organization was formed by a group of Chicagoans who had assembled the previous year to save a group of buildings which included Coe Mansion, which had once housed Ranalli's pizzeria and The Red Carpet, a French restaurant that had been frequented by Jack Benny and Elizabeth Taylor. Other preservation campaigns that were instrumental in the founding of Preservation Chicago included St. Boniface Church, the Scherer Building, and the New York Life Insurance Building.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)