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Inside the New Hampton Inn at the Art Deco Chicago Motor Club Building

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[Photos by Nick Fochtman]

Originally designed by Holabird and Root and built in 1928, the Chicago Motor Club building—a longtime office building and Art Deco gem that has gone unoccupied since 2004—has recently completed its full renovation to become home to Chicago's new Hampton Inn. The hotel's vast, three-story lobby—which contains a new, 67-seat cocktail bar overlooked by a John Warner Norton-original, 29-foot-wide road map mural—is one of the building's most striking rooms, replete with Art Deco flourishes and original lighting fixtures that hearken back to the building's days as a dedicated, pre-AAA-era auto club. To cap it all off, the hotel also installed an original, 1928 Ford Model A to overlook the lobby. And then above the lobby rises 14 floors of rooms, for a total of 143 keys, some of which retain their original doors and millwork. Hartshorne Plunkard provided the architectural design for the now-LEED Certified landmark building, which also underwent an exterior restoration to repair the terra cotta, stone, and limestone facade. Aside from adding some finishing touches on the entrance canopy, the hotel is open for business in anticipation of its official official opening in June.

·Previous Chicago Motor Club coverage [Curbed Chicago]
·Chicago Motor Club Building [Forgotten Chicago]
·Hampton Inn Chicago Downtown/N Loop/Michigan Ave [Hampton Inn]