Luckily, the team had a great partner in Valerio Dewalt Train, which tailored the existing structure to Gettys’ interior design plan. “It was a great building to begin with,” McDonough says. “The beauty was, we could benefit from the history of the architect of record and then improve it, ideally, with this new team.”
The architecture firm had envisioned the hotel’s design as a taut wrapping of cubist forms that shift inward and outward to reveal the building’s structural frame. The interiors reflect the building’s striking architecture through the interplay of strong geometric forms and the smart use of color, such as the large concentric ring pendant hanging in the marble-clad, oval-shaped lobby and the sexy red leather elliptical banquettes in the rooftop lounge.
Whether dealing with a new build, a conversion, or a renovation, a collaborative approach to design is integral to a hotel project’s success. In the case of The Godfrey, all parties involved shared the same end goal, McDonough says, which made it easier to make decisions and navigate any challenges along the way. They ironed out the details, big and small, as a team, whether it was making sure everyone was happy with the number of guestrooms versus public space or achieving the right seating mix on the rooftop.
While Gettys prefers to be involved in a project early on to help shape the hospitality programming, rather than midway through construction, it wasn’t too late to rethink the layout of The Godfrey. Within the first few weeks on the job, the firm suggested adding a fourth-floor urban roofscape that would create additional streams of revenue and better leverage the amount of space available.
The River North neighborhood is busy and energetic, McDonough says, so they wanted to reflect that same liveliness on the fourth floor. Encompassing approximately 15,000 square feet of indoor and outdoor space, with 10,000 square feet of lounge and event space, the I|O Urban Roofscape became the pièce de résistance of the project. It features two full-service bars, a fire pit, water elements, a video wall, and a retractable roof. The indoor bar has plush banquettes and a VIP area. The indoor-outdoor event space can accommodate up to 750 reception guests, while two meeting rooms are designed for a small executive retreat for 10 or a training seminar for 100. The bar and lounge offers breakfast, an all-day menu, and weekend brunch, plus a wide range of cocktails, beers, wines, champagnes, and bottle service. A new restaurant, Dolce Italian, which will be connected to the first-floor lobby, is scheduled to open in late spring.
Since The Godfrey opened, the public areas have attracted a wide range of demographics, fluctuating from day to night. “We’re still trying to get business and groups and other revenue streams,” McDonough says, “but the design has to be flexible enough to account for all of it.”
As a counterpoint to all that energy, Gettys wanted to create comfortable, spacious guestrooms with spa-like bathrooms. The team carefully mapped out the footprint to maximize the number of rooms without sacrificing design quality. “We want to make sure the building performs as well as it can and let the design shine,” McDonough says. The visual imagery of classic men’s suiting is especially evident in the guestrooms, which feature a minimalist palette of grays and whites, dynamic textures and patterns, and pops of color.
The project presented a unique opportunity for Gettys to be on the ground floor of creating not just a one-off hotel but also a new brand that has development potential in major cities across the country. McDonough says they took an almost reserved approach to the design to ensure the brand has staying power. “The owner and Gettys both have a longer term strategy with these hotels,” he says. “The goal is that they’re comfortable for a variety of guests.”
Oxford Capital expects to open its second Godfrey Hotel in the historic Amory and Blake office buildings in Boston’s Downtown Crossing neighborhood this fall, with interiors designed by Gettys. “Gettys is working on a number of Godfrey hotels, and there are relationships across the different hotel locations, but the buildings themselves are very different,” McDonough says. “This isn’t a cookie-cutter brand. We want each one to have a personality and create a smart, different approach to applying this brand to different cities.”
