Hospitality Design - February 2017 - 48

perspectives

interview steve wilson

6. The lobby of 21c
Oklahoma City doubles as
an art gallery.
7. The 21c Lexington's
design references old
clubhouses and the
saturated colors of the
bluegrass landscape,
notably in a lush sofa in
the lobby gallery's lounge.
8. A model guestroom
at the upcoming 21c
Nashville, where bright
colors and patterns
juxtapose wood and
metal.

8
arms wide open. A corporate meeting planner
had booked the room before that piece went up,
and then when it came time for the convention,
they wanted us to take it down. I wouldn't take it
down so we put a sheet over it.

On each property's iconic colorful
penguins, made from recycled polythene
It was one of those wonderful accidents. The
penguins are by Italian company, the Cracking
Art Group. I was at the Venice Biennale, and the
penguins were all over the city.
I bought a group of them, and they were
arranged in an exhibition in the atrium when we
opened. People loved them and started moving
them around. Now the city of Louisville uses
them in its tourism ads and people do try to steal
them. One night, one of our bartenders noticed
through a window that a woman was walking
down the sidewalk with a penguin. He went
out and said, 'Where are you going?' And she
said, 'He wants to take a ride on a trolley.' The
bartender said, 'I think he wants to stay home'
and took it back.

7
us open the first restaurant [Proof on Main], then
a couple of his people ended up staying with us.
On the hotel side, we fired two management
companies before we decided to manage it
ourselves. I don't know why people in hospitality
don't understand how to be hospitable. We have
what we call a 'yes' culture. You don't walk up to
our front desk and get a no. We try to help people
out. For instance, a guy couldn't remember where
he parked his car, so the front-desk [team] helped
him find [it].
We always open our restaurants a couple of
weeks before the hotel, with its own name. We
want to build a local audience for the restaurant,
which is always chef-driven and local. By the time
the hotel opens, hopefully, we are ready.
There was a period of time when I worried if
it was really going to work. But then we got on the
Condé Nast Traveler Readers' Choice Awards list

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February 2017 hospitalitydesign.com

in 2008-we were No. 16 of 25. We made it a goal
to be in the top 10 by 2010, and we were No. 1 the
next year. That was great.

On being called an art hotel

We were in a story some months ago about art
hotels, and it irritated me a bit because we are
really the only art hotel. When you get down to
the details, there's some great art in some lobbies,
like the W in Miami, for instance. But they've
never been changed since the day they opened.
They are just decorations. We take some risks. I
don't try to offend people, but it happens. We have
a joke that people who get offended love to come
back and be offended again. We sometimes even
get letters.
For instance, there was a very large portrait of
a nude female, resembling Jesus on a cross. She
had a loincloth, but she was bare breasted and her

On working with Berke

We've learned a lot together, and we work well
together. We usually agree when something
didn't work quite right and that we can do it
better next time. I like that she's not intent on
putting her stamp on everything. She can do new
builds or a renovation, and creates really wellthought-out design. We knew we were starting
with art, and we wanted an architect who had
worked with art or understood that. And she had
worked on an apartment that was done entirely in
shades of gray. It was like going into an old black
and white movie. The attention to detail and the
ability to do that was impressive.

On finding inspiration

Coming to New York. Just for a day or two,
walking on the sidewalk, displays at Bergdorf
Goodman, going to art galleries, trying new
restaurants. Everything's an inspiration. hd

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Hospitality Design - February 2017

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