Quirk Hotel opens in Richmond on Sept. 17

Published September 16, 2015 by Jessica Sabbath

Quirk Hotel opens in Richmond on Sept. 17

The first phase of Richmond’s newest boutique hotel is ready in time for city’s international bike races.

Richmond’s newest boutique hotel, which combined the talents of husband and wife team Katie and Ted Ukrop, opens on Thursday, Sept. 17. 

While not all of Quirk Hotel’s 75 rooms are ready, the 54 rooms that are available are booked as the city gears up to host cycling’s biggest event, the UCI World Road Cycling Championships (Worlds). The races start Saturday and continue for nine days through Sept. 27.

The hotel is located in a historic landmark at 201 W. Broad St., just a few blocks from the race’s main grandstand area at 5th and Broad Streets. The 60,000-square-foot Italian Renaissance building, originally constructed in 1916, is the former home of  J.B. Mosby & Co. dry goods department store.

With the first guests arriving Thursday, the hotel is opening in phases. Two floors will open then along with the building’s grand lobby and its Maple and Pine Restaurant. The remainder of the rooms are expected to open by Nov. 1., along with the hotel’s rooftop terrace and bar.  Room rates are $269 a night mid-week, and $289 a night on weekends. They will drop to the high $190s during the November, December and January, according to the hotel's publicist.

The renovation of the building has retained the lobby’s soaring segmental arches, large windows and ornamental ironwork staircase. As homage to the building’s former days as a department store, specially designed, glass cases
adorn the lobby, housing museum-like objects and collections
such as vintage hats, while also acting as space partitions.

Many of the building’s original wood floors are intact, while 100-
year-old beams taken out of the original structure during
demolition have been repurposed in walnut bedframes in the
guestrooms. 

Quirk Gallery, from which the hotel gains much of its inspiration, plans to open in its new location in a three-story building adjoining the hotel on Saturday, Sept. 19. The gallery is connected to the building via a courtyard. Katie Ukrop has owned the gallery for 10 years, while husband Ted’s family owned the former Ukrop’s grocerty store chain, the region’s No. 1 grocery store prior to its sale. They are the developers behind the hotel/gallery project along with Christian Kiniry of Bank Street Advisors.

What makes Quirk different is the artistic experience it plans to offer with the gallery that will feature local and regional artists along with other items made by artists that will be available for purchase throughout the hotel. Art will also hang in guest rooms that have been painted in hues of a neutral gray or a salmon pink color that’s called Love and Happiness.

Quirk also has an artist-in-residence program. The hotel’s first artist in residence is Leigh Suggs, a 2015 Virginia Commonwealth University Craft Materials MFA graduate with a concentration in textiles. She will be in residence until January 2016.

Destination Hotels, based out of Englewood, Colo., will manage the hotel. The general contractor is W.M. Jordan Co.  Portsmouth-based TowneBank is the lender. 3north Architects designed the project and Poesis did the interior design.