21c Museum Hotel Chicago: 2020 Best of Year Winner for Domestic Hospitality Transformation
February 6, 2021
The interior renovation of the latest addition to 21c Museum Hotels’ nine-property portfolio all by Interior Design Hall of Fame member Deborah Berke provides a fine example of her firm working at the height of its powers. Articulating the hospitality brand’s art-driven concept was a top priority in refashioning the 297-room, 16-story high-rise, a 1927 brick structure that was a hotel from the get-go the James, most recently. To create gallerylike spaces that privileged the experience of contemporary art, attention was paid to the public areas and how they flowed. Berke and team devised a double-height lobby and relocated the main staircase, offering an engaging visual path and a museum-quality setting for the art, some of it monumental, like the life-size sculpture of a man on a bison by THE KID, a French artist. Guest rooms are bright and airy, with a calm palette dra