Hotel Saint Louis

Hotel Saint Louis opened on 20 December 2018 in the Union Trust Building at 705 Olive Street, downtown St. Louis. Adler & Sullivan designed it in the early 1890s (sources give 1892 or 1893), about 208 feet tall and 186,617 square feet. It had been offices and shops until then, and this is its first life as a hotel. Amy and Amrit Gill's firm, Restoration St. Louis, bought the mostly vacant building in 2015. Reported costs vary with the date of the article: a $47 million proposal, then $68 million, then $71 million for the finished three-year restoration.

The place

The building stands at 7th and Olive streets in the downtown core and is a St. Louis City Landmark, number 30, as well as a listing on the National Register of Historic Places. From the 16th-floor bar the view takes in Busch Stadium.

The concept

Sullivan's firm had already built the Wainwright Building in 1891, often cited as the first successful steel-frame skyscraper. The Union Trust Building was its second St. Louis commission, and one of roughly 30 Sullivan buildings that still stand.

Before the restoration it had worn windows, failing elevators, decaying terra cotta and outdated systems. A 1924 alteration had removed the arched entrance and its 15-foot gargoyles and swapped the large round second-floor windows for square ones. The new team rebuilt the grand entrance in cast stone from Sullivan's original design, but the gargoyles and round windows did not return. Nathan Zierer of Checkmate Design led the architecture.

Because no interior photographs existed, much of the inside was reconstructed from research. Original plasterwork turned up under five layers of lobby ceilings and was replicated, a stained-glass atrium roof was re-created, and the Tennessee marble landings at each elevator were kept. The angled walls in the four corners proved to be old chimneys. The lobby was originally two storeys.

The top three floors hold 140 rooms and suites, 14 apartment units and a penthouse. Interior designers Eiler and Beanblossom used a St. Louis blue in furniture, carpet and rooms. Room wallpaper reproduces photographs of the building's cornice, headboards echo the shape of the Gateway Arch, and the minibars carry locally made snacks.

Dining & wellness

Union 30 is the ground-floor restaurant, a 2,500-square-foot room of about 100 seats that opens onto the lobby. Its name refers to the building's landmark number and to the roughly 30 Sullivan buildings left standing. The kitchen serves classic dishes and traditional St. Louis fare.

Form, the skybar on the 16th floor, takes its name from Sullivan's maxim that form follows function. SPACE Architecture helped design it, with large chandeliers and big windows that open. Executive chef Matt Birkenmeier wrote the menu, and a rooftop pool was added later.