Trumping The Best Views In Chicago
Trump International Hotel & Tower in Chicago offers jaw dropping cityscapes, understated contemporary elegance.
-- Hotels, 6/1/2008
To look out from almost any vantage point of Chicago’s Trump International Hotel & Tower, is to appreciate some of the best city views in Chicago history. The ornate Tribune and Wrigley buildings tower to the north. The Michigan Avenue bridge and Chicago River front the east side of the hotel. And bustling Wabash Avenue with its constantly moving landscape of elevated trains, shoppers and taxis is the view to the south. Sheathed in iridescent tinted glass, with gently curving floor to ceiling windows throughout, the hotel makes Chicago breathtakingly visible. Built on the site of the former, ten-story Chicago Sun Times building, Trump tower is poised at one of the most visited spots in the city: the juncture of the Chicago River and North Michigan Avenue. Ninety-two stories tall, with private condos on floors 28 through 92 and 339 hotel/condo guestrooms and suites on the adjacent 14 floors, the newest Trump property makes a bold, yet elegantly understated design statement.
Entered from the west, the hotel lobby—fronted with two stories of glass window—is a creamy vault of Italian Carrera marble, inset with contrasting accent panels of rich chocolate and gold-veined zebra wood. Overhead, a grand-scale alabaster lighting oval, ringed with wenge wood, softly glows. To the north, guests can relax into a cushy lobby lounge—soon to offer champagne service—or, head up a curving marble staircase to the hotel’s mezzanine-level hotspot, Rebar, visible through cutouts in the lobby’s marble walls. Here, interior architect Peter Gumpel and interior designer Peter McGinley, have given guests multiple seating options, with varying energy levels. A roomy yet intimate section with couches and low tables overlooking the lobby offers a communal space to cozy. Following curved frosted glass panels into the bar proper, guests can perch along the busy bar, settle at numerous tables or at clustered velour couches and chairs for more spectacular views out to the river and Michigan Avenue beyond. Oversized pillar-like elements to the north and south of the room are covered with tiny, framed antique prints of the gears and levers used to operate bridges—a coy connection to the bridge view. And enlarged prints of sections of paintings by Caravaggio add classical richness to the otherwise contemporary scene.
In keeping with Trump’s quest to intuit and smooth guest experience, the hotel has shaped numerous elevator lobbies with guest access and privacy in mind. One lobby was designed to be accessed by guests frequenting the bar and restaurant. Another is for condo residents only. Another is intended for spa guests, and includes a grand marble, steel and glass staircase linking 53 spa guestrooms, to the spa entrance one floor above. Yet one more has been shaped for the arrival of event guests.
Guestroom corridors in silvery mauve with sculpted carpets lead to a variety of guestrooms and suites which exude a cool, uncluttered sophistication—25 guest rooms per floor. The smallest are still a spacious 600 feet, with 10-foot, floor to ceiling windows offering more unobstructed views. All are equipped with high-end galley kitchens outfitted with stainless Sub-zero fridges, Miele cooktops and Nespresso machines. Likewise residential-feeling suites offer 1,000 or more square feet to lounge. Here, full kitchens include Wolf ovens (private-chef and attaché service is offered), and there are silver velour seating areas with gas fireplaces.
Like the corridors, guestroom palettes include soothing gradations of silver, gray, mauve and cream. Bathrooms, finished in Portuguese limestone, include wetroom-style bath and showers in standard guestrooms, and even larger separate shower and deep-soak tubs in suites, plus in-mirror TV panels.
On the 16th floor, Sixteen restaurant is also a quiet expression of well-scaled luxury, featuring the Modern American cuisine of chef Frank Brunacci. Stepping out of the elevators, guests eyes are immediately drawn through a passageway to the tip tops of the Tribune Tower and Wrigley building, both illuminated nightly and visible through soaring, 30-ft. tall glass windows. These curve in an uninterrupted 180 degree arc around the restaurant and its adjacent private dining room, bar, and Bridges room for overflow bar business and lunch crowds.
Proceeding to the 76-seat restaurant, guests walk between Sixteen’s glassed-in, working, wine library, displaying 900 correctly chilled bottles. Floors are paved with iron-rich stone quarried in St Croix, France. Ceilings here are intentionally low, adding more drama to the wine display, and, creating a scaled progression to the main dining room. Giving the views their unobstructed due, ornamentation in the room is limited to a dramatic, 19,000- pendant Swarovski crystal chandelier and a large-scaled sweep of inset African kevazinga wood panels that stretch ceilingward opposite the windows. Cleverly, designer Randy Mattheis of Valerio, Dewalt, Trane Associates cut an oversized mirrored cove into the woodwork so that guests dining with their backs to the windows would still see reflected city views. Giving the restaurant a sense of place, blown glass art vases by Chicago artisans are prominently displayed at the entrance and in the private dining room. Also graced with local beauty, broad outdoor terraces are being planted with native river grasses, and will provide al fresco dining space for restaurant and event guests.
Two levels down, Trump’s 23,000 sq. ft Spa includes 11 treatment rooms. Making visitors feel at home, the hotel includes 53 spa guestrooms on, or adjacent to, the spa level. These allow guests to move between room and spa in comfortable spa garb without mingling with the public. Both spa and spa guestrooms are designed with quiet taupe and earthtoned color schemes with pickled oak accents. Soon to come? The hotel’s 75-foot swimming pool will be the first in Chicago to provide thalassotherapy.
Since opening, Sales and Marketing Director Robert Prohaska says the hotel has been hopping. Fully, 70% of the units—all double as condos and guestrooms—have been sold. Also a draw? The hotel is participating in the redo and widening of Chicago’s River Plaza. Adjacent to the hotel, Trump is building a broad plaza space and park area which will include 90,000 square feet of dining and retail space, connected with multi-level walkways. Add this to its custom focus, condo positioning and residential features and Trump says it believes it offers many points of difference from other luxury hotels in the area. According to T. Colm O'Callaghan, vice president and managing director for the hotel, the property is targeting the business, leisure travel (drive-in, domestic and international) and local markets. ”With people keeping vacations closer to home, the property provides a fabulous getaway option right in Chicago's backyard,” says O’Callaghan.
Discussing overseas guests, he says, "Generally overseas visitors to Chicago are around 10%, but a growing and affluent 10%. We should match the market by early 2009. Our rate and occupancy levels will also be in line with the other luxury hotels in the city."
