After a 55-year slumber and four-year restoration effort, the revived Hotel Petersburg is back open and welcoming its first guests in half a century.
The boutique hotel in the heart of Old Towne Petersburg opens today as the second iteration of the original Hotel Petersburg that opened in 1916.
The seven-story, 64-room hotel features original building details along with modern-day amenities, from the restored marble-columned lobby and restaurant on the ground floor, to an open-air bar and lounge on the rooftop with panoramic views of downtown Petersburg.
The hotel also features a bar off the lobby, a 48-seat banquet room with 2,200 square feet of space, a 36-seat courtyard with silent movies projected on a wall, a fitness room, and additional meeting rooms and gathering areas. A speakeasy-style lounge is in the works for the building’s boiler room.
The Hotel Petersburg building as it appeared in 2021 with many of the windows boarded up. (BizSense file photo)
The $23 million project has been four years in the making, with restoration work ramping up in 2022 and wrapping up this year after being slowed during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Since it last operated as a hotel in 1969, the century-old building at 20 W. Tabb St. had been largely unused until developer Nat Cuthbert bought it in 2017.
Three years later, at the outset of the pandemic, the Petersburg native announced plans to restore and reopen the hotel, enlisting a team that included Richmond-based consulting firm Retro Hospitality, whose portfolio includes Quirk Hotel in Richmond.
While the Hotel Petersburg project took two years longer than anticipated, and went well over its initially projected budget of $13 million-plus, Cuthbert said he is pleased with the result, which revives a building he grew up admiring.
Developer Nat Cuthbert cutting the ribbon on Hotel Petersburg with Gov. Glenn Youngkin at a ceremony in October. (Photo courtesy governor’s office)
“It was a very challenging project, but I think we executed well and we got to a very good end point, so I’m really excited that we’re about to throw those doors open and let it do its thing,” Cuthbert said Tuesday.
“It was a real top-to-bottom, inside-to-outside job, incorporating modern innovations and changes, so it all added up to be a very challenging project. But I was very fortunate that a great team of people coalesced and made it all happen. Without that great team, it couldn’t have happened and wouldn’t have been the great result that we have.”
Affiliated with hotel brand Hilton’s Tapestry Collection, Hotel Petersburg also is aligned with Historic Hotels of America, a program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation that recognizes hotels “that have faithfully maintained their historic integrity, architecture and ambiance,” according to its website.
Retro Hospitality’s Paul Cooper on the hotel’s rooftop, which features panoramic views of downtown Petersburg. (Jonathan Spiers photos)
Retro Hospitality’s Paul Cooper said securing both affiliations was vital to the project, which involved state and federal historic rehab tax credits and a mix of funding sources including traditional loans and grants.
“We have a global brand behind the hotel, which was a huge get,” Cooper said of the Hilton affiliation. “They saw the vision and jumped on board right away, and that was key to securing financing and additional credibility for this hotel. And it’ll be a great source of revenue through their reservation system and overall partnership.”
Nightly rates range from about $140 for a room with a queen or king bed to about $200 for a king-bed suite with soaking tub, according to rates posted on the hotel’s website for December.
Rooms throughout the hotel feature pictures of how they looked before renovation. While the building was filled with dust and dirt and had some water intrusion in the ceilings and wood moldings, Cooper said it was largely like a time capsule with much of its original features preserved.
“It was in almost a suspended state, because the property closed in 1970, and then to walk in 50-plus years later, it was like, ‘Man, this is well-preserved,’” he said. “All that marble you really can’t replicate, and it’s not going to go anywhere.”
A photo in the bar shows how the room looked pre-restoration.
Originally built with 125 rooms, the building was designed by Charles Robinson, a noted architect whose work in Richmond included the former Highland Park School and Fox Elementary School, as well as the First English Lutheran Church on Stuart Circle.
A team of Virginia-based companies and craftspeople rebuilt and restored the building’s interior details. Cooper said the work, from refinishing wood to repairing window encasements, was all done by hand. He said the window repairs cost about $10,000 per window.
“Everything’s been done meticulously to bring it back to its natural state,” he said.
Hotel Petersburg in its heyday.
Companies involved in the project include interior design firm Thomas Hamilton & Associates out of Richmond, Simpatico Design Studio out of Fredericksburg, Richmond-based Porter Street Purchasing and Petersburg-based Atlantic Makers. Loughridge & Co. was the general contractor, and The Yellow Room, also out of Richmond, was the architect. Mechanicsville-based Covington Design Group handled engineering work.
Berkadia sourced the project financing, and Old Point National Bank handled loan financing. Norfolk-based Commonwealth Preservation Group and Richmond-based Complete Community Economies assisted with the tax credits and applications. The project won Best Restoration at this year’s Golden Hammer awards for standout real estate projects.
With 15-foot-high ceilings, the lobby features the original terrazzo tile floor and marble front desk with wooden mail slots. A side room that was once a ladies’ writing room provides an additional sitting area with vintage secretary desks, and the lobby also leads to a gift shop and Shirley’s Restaurant & Bar, the name a reference to an earlier hotel that stood on the site.
The building at 20 W. Tabb St. is a block west of Sycamore Street in Old Towne Petersburg.
The restaurant is served by a two-level kitchen helmed by Executive Chef Mina Mahrous, a Texas transplant who previously worked at the Overton Hotel and the Buddy Holly Hall performance center in Lubbock and most recently was an executive chef at UVA.
General Manager Thomas Sullivan, previously with The Blake Hotel in New Haven, Connecticut, leads an opening staff of over 50 employees.
Cooper said the hotel has already hosted meetings for Civica, the nonprofit drugmaker with a presence in Petersburg, as well as for Virginia State University, which plans to use the hotel as a classroom for its hospitality management program. Virginia’s Gateway Region, an economic development group, also has brought prospective businesses to the hotel, Cooper said.
“Folks are really excited. It’s been building over the last six years,” Cooper said. “Every year continues to provide more and more momentum, and now with the casino coming on board and the governor’s Partnership for Petersburg and all the investment that’s being made, it’s really exciting to be a part of.”
Petersburg voters in November approved the city’s $1.4 billion casino project, and in October, Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s Partnership for Petersburg initiative was touted with events including a ribbon-cutting for Hotel Petersburg, which received a $600,000 grant in 2021 through the Industrial Revitalization Fund of the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development.
Gov. Youngkin giving remarks at October’s ribbon-cutting. (Photo courtesy governor’s office)
The state also has committed $2.2 million via gap financing through Virginia Tourism Corp. and a loan through the Virginia Small Business Financing Authority to support Hotel Petersburg’s opening, according to a release. The release from Youngkin’s office put the project’s total capital investment at more than $23 million and projected an initial-year tax benefit of $675,000.
The ribbon-cutting was held the same day as a groundbreaking ceremony for Sycamore Grove, a $9 million mixed-use development that’s also part of Partnership for Petersburg and is to include a supermarket, restaurants and 145 new homes. D.C.-based Cober Johnson & Romney is leading that development, with Reston-based Ryan Homes signed on to build the homes.
After a 55-year slumber and four-year restoration effort, the revived Hotel Petersburg is back open and welcoming its first guests in half a century.
The boutique hotel in the heart of Old Towne Petersburg opens today as the second iteration of the original Hotel Petersburg that opened in 1916.
The seven-story, 64-room hotel features original building details along with modern-day amenities, from the restored marble-columned lobby and restaurant on the ground floor, to an open-air bar and lounge on the rooftop with panoramic views of downtown Petersburg.
The hotel also features a bar off the lobby, a 48-seat banquet room with 2,200 square feet of space, a 36-seat courtyard with silent movies projected on a wall, a fitness room, and additional meeting rooms and gathering areas. A speakeasy-style lounge is in the works for the building’s boiler room.
The Hotel Petersburg building as it appeared in 2021 with many of the windows boarded up. (BizSense file photo)
The $23 million project has been four years in the making, with restoration work ramping up in 2022 and wrapping up this year after being slowed during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Since it last operated as a hotel in 1969, the century-old building at 20 W. Tabb St. had been largely unused until developer Nat Cuthbert bought it in 2017.
Three years later, at the outset of the pandemic, the Petersburg native announced plans to restore and reopen the hotel, enlisting a team that included Richmond-based consulting firm Retro Hospitality, whose portfolio includes Quirk Hotel in Richmond.
While the Hotel Petersburg project took two years longer than anticipated, and went well over its initially projected budget of $13 million-plus, Cuthbert said he is pleased with the result, which revives a building he grew up admiring.
Developer Nat Cuthbert cutting the ribbon on Hotel Petersburg with Gov. Glenn Youngkin at a ceremony in October. (Photo courtesy governor’s office)
“It was a very challenging project, but I think we executed well and we got to a very good end point, so I’m really excited that we’re about to throw those doors open and let it do its thing,” Cuthbert said Tuesday.
“It was a real top-to-bottom, inside-to-outside job, incorporating modern innovations and changes, so it all added up to be a very challenging project. But I was very fortunate that a great team of people coalesced and made it all happen. Without that great team, it couldn’t have happened and wouldn’t have been the great result that we have.”
Affiliated with hotel brand Hilton’s Tapestry Collection, Hotel Petersburg also is aligned with Historic Hotels of America, a program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation that recognizes hotels “that have faithfully maintained their historic integrity, architecture and ambiance,” according to its website.
Retro Hospitality’s Paul Cooper on the hotel’s rooftop, which features panoramic views of downtown Petersburg. (Jonathan Spiers photos)
Retro Hospitality’s Paul Cooper said securing both affiliations was vital to the project, which involved state and federal historic rehab tax credits and a mix of funding sources including traditional loans and grants.
“We have a global brand behind the hotel, which was a huge get,” Cooper said of the Hilton affiliation. “They saw the vision and jumped on board right away, and that was key to securing financing and additional credibility for this hotel. And it’ll be a great source of revenue through their reservation system and overall partnership.”
Nightly rates range from about $140 for a room with a queen or king bed to about $200 for a king-bed suite with soaking tub, according to rates posted on the hotel’s website for December.
Rooms throughout the hotel feature pictures of how they looked before renovation. While the building was filled with dust and dirt and had some water intrusion in the ceilings and wood moldings, Cooper said it was largely like a time capsule with much of its original features preserved.
“It was in almost a suspended state, because the property closed in 1970, and then to walk in 50-plus years later, it was like, ‘Man, this is well-preserved,’” he said. “All that marble you really can’t replicate, and it’s not going to go anywhere.”
A photo in the bar shows how the room looked pre-restoration.
Originally built with 125 rooms, the building was designed by Charles Robinson, a noted architect whose work in Richmond included the former Highland Park School and Fox Elementary School, as well as the First English Lutheran Church on Stuart Circle.
A team of Virginia-based companies and craftspeople rebuilt and restored the building’s interior details. Cooper said the work, from refinishing wood to repairing window encasements, was all done by hand. He said the window repairs cost about $10,000 per window.
“Everything’s been done meticulously to bring it back to its natural state,” he said.
Hotel Petersburg in its heyday.
Companies involved in the project include interior design firm Thomas Hamilton & Associates out of Richmond, Simpatico Design Studio out of Fredericksburg, Richmond-based Porter Street Purchasing and Petersburg-based Atlantic Makers. Loughridge & Co. was the general contractor, and The Yellow Room, also out of Richmond, was the architect. Mechanicsville-based Covington Design Group handled engineering work.
Berkadia sourced the project financing, and Old Point National Bank handled loan financing. Norfolk-based Commonwealth Preservation Group and Richmond-based Complete Community Economies assisted with the tax credits and applications. The project won Best Restoration at this year’s Golden Hammer awards for standout real estate projects.
With 15-foot-high ceilings, the lobby features the original terrazzo tile floor and marble front desk with wooden mail slots. A side room that was once a ladies’ writing room provides an additional sitting area with vintage secretary desks, and the lobby also leads to a gift shop and Shirley’s Restaurant & Bar, the name a reference to an earlier hotel that stood on the site.
The building at 20 W. Tabb St. is a block west of Sycamore Street in Old Towne Petersburg.
The restaurant is served by a two-level kitchen helmed by Executive Chef Mina Mahrous, a Texas transplant who previously worked at the Overton Hotel and the Buddy Holly Hall performance center in Lubbock and most recently was an executive chef at UVA.
General Manager Thomas Sullivan, previously with The Blake Hotel in New Haven, Connecticut, leads an opening staff of over 50 employees.
Cooper said the hotel has already hosted meetings for Civica, the nonprofit drugmaker with a presence in Petersburg, as well as for Virginia State University, which plans to use the hotel as a classroom for its hospitality management program. Virginia’s Gateway Region, an economic development group, also has brought prospective businesses to the hotel, Cooper said.
“Folks are really excited. It’s been building over the last six years,” Cooper said. “Every year continues to provide more and more momentum, and now with the casino coming on board and the governor’s Partnership for Petersburg and all the investment that’s being made, it’s really exciting to be a part of.”
Petersburg voters in November approved the city’s $1.4 billion casino project, and in October, Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s Partnership for Petersburg initiative was touted with events including a ribbon-cutting for Hotel Petersburg, which received a $600,000 grant in 2021 through the Industrial Revitalization Fund of the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development.
Gov. Youngkin giving remarks at October’s ribbon-cutting. (Photo courtesy governor’s office)
The state also has committed $2.2 million via gap financing through Virginia Tourism Corp. and a loan through the Virginia Small Business Financing Authority to support Hotel Petersburg’s opening, according to a release. The release from Youngkin’s office put the project’s total capital investment at more than $23 million and projected an initial-year tax benefit of $675,000.
The ribbon-cutting was held the same day as a groundbreaking ceremony for Sycamore Grove, a $9 million mixed-use development that’s also part of Partnership for Petersburg and is to include a supermarket, restaurants and 145 new homes. D.C.-based Cober Johnson & Romney is leading that development, with Reston-based Ryan Homes signed on to build the homes.
Petersburg future looks very bright! Praying for the continued positive momentum. It’s been a long time for this once great city.
Great job
Amazing Win for a Historic building. Good luck.
Retro Hospitality’s portfolio continues to impress.
Great article!
Where’s the thumbs up emoji?
Well done! Wishing the very best for this hotel and the owners!
I look forward to staying at the property and wish the management team, staff and ownership much success.
I am so happy for the City of Petersburg. Bring it back