In 1999, the first Ace Hotel was opened. Friends Alex Calderwood, Wade Weigel, and Doug Herrick purchased and transformed a
Seattlehalfway house into an affordable hotel that would appeal to the
creative class. Calderwood and Weigel had previously founded
Rudy's, a reinvigorated traditional barbershop concept they started in Seattle, which eventually expanded to more than a dozen locations, along with an experiential marketing company known as Neverstop, and an audiovisual arts platform known as ARO.Space with
Pearl Jam co-founder Stone Gossard and
Kung Faux creator Mic Neumann, who is credited for bringing in such artists as
Kaws and
Shepard Fairey to decorate the walls of various Rudy's and Ace Hotel locations.[1]
In 2006, Jack Barron and Tungsten Partners founder Michael Bisordi joined as owners. The group then opened a second hotel in Portland, Oregon followed by properties in Palm Springs, California and New York City in 2009.[2]
In 2011, Ace Hotel collaborated with Uslu Airlines to create a nail polish sold exclusively in the hotels' mini-bars.[citation needed]
In 2013, an Ace Hotel opened in the Shoreditch neighborhood of
London,[3] where Calderwood had defined a goal of opening a new Ace Hotel every "one to two years", before his untimely death at age 47 on November 16, 2013.[4]
In 2014, a downtown Los Angeles location of the Ace Hotel opened in a former theatre, followed by Ace Hotel locations in Pittsburgh in 2015, New Orleans in 2016, and Chicago in 2017.[citation needed]
In 2020, an Ace Hotel location opened in
Kyoto, Japan that was designed by
Kengo Kuma.[5] In September 2020, it was announced that Ace Hotel London Shoreditch would not reopen after being closed because of the
COVID-19 pandemic.[6]
In 2021, Ace Hotel opened locations in Brooklyn, New York; Toronto, Canada and Sydney, Australia.[citation needed]
In 2022, Ace Hotel filed for arbitration against David Paz's Omnia Group and was awarded $10.4 million after alleging the property owner of a Manhattan location managed by the Ace Hotel Group hurt the brand and future earnings by taking a deal with the city of New York to house the homeless during the COVID-19 pandemic.[7]
In 2023, the Wall Street Journal reported that the Portland, Oregon-based hospitality firm, Sortis Holdings, had reached an agreement to acquire the Ace Hotel Group brand and its hotel management company for $85 million in an all cash transaction.[8]
Locations
According to Calderwood, the style and furnishing of each Ace property is designed to reflect its location, with an eye towards re-imagining properties that are "challenged."[9]
Ace Hotel Brooklyn
Ace Hotel Kyoto opened on June 11, 2020, in a building originally designed by
Tetsuro Yoshida for the Kyoto Central Telephone Company in 1926. The
registeredTaishō era property was redesigned by
Kengo Kuma.[10][11]
Ace Hotel New Orleans opened in March 2016 in a 1928
Art Deco building in New Orleans' Warehouse District.[12]
Ace Hotel & Swim Club in
Palm Springs, CA is a converted
Howard Johnson motel, formerly a Westward Ho. King's Highway, the hotel's on-site diner, is a converted
Denny's. There are two bars, the Amigo Room, and poolside, the Short Bus. The remodel was a collaboration with L.A.-based design firm,
Commune.
Ace Hotel Seattle is a former
Salvation Army halfway house located in the
Belltown neighborhood.
Ace Hotel Sydney
Ace Hotel Toronto opened July 2022. The first Canadian site for the Ace Hotel, the property is notable as their first original build.[17]
Former locations:
The American Trade Hotel is a restored five-story stucco building in the
Casco Viejo historical district of Panama City.[18] It was associated with Ace Hotels for a number of years after its opening.
Ace Hotel London was in London's
Shoreditch arts district, on the site of the original Shoreditch Empire music hall.[19] The groups first location outside of the US, Ace Hotel London Shoreditch closed in September 2020.[6]
Ace Hotel Pittsburgh opened in an historic
YMCA building in the city's
East Liberty neighborhood in December 2015, and closed in 2021.
Ace Hotel Downtown Los Angeles opened in January 2014 in the historic United Artists Building, with 180 rooms and a restored United Artists Theater performance venue. Closed in 2024.
In popular culture
The 2011 episode "Blunderbuss" of the sketch comedy series Portlandia had a sketch set at the "Deuce Hotel", where the obnoxiously hip staff hand out complimentary
turntables and
typewriters to all guests;[20] it was a parody specifically of Ace Hotel Portland.[21]
On her song
Ace, rapper
Noname talks about being at Ace Hotel in London.[22]