VANCOUVER — The 202-room EXchange Hotel Vancouver has opened its doors. With a glamorous seasonal rooftop bar (still getting its finishing touches) and a swank 1920s art deco-inspired atmosphere, the property boasts a unique classic contemporary design.
Originally built as headquarters for The Vancouver Stock Exchange in 1929, the building has been redesigned as a modern 32-storey architectural masterpiece. The EXchange Hotel’s Italianate lobby ceiling has been fully restored, along with the rest of the original marble-clad Howe Street lobby. The adjacent newly constructed atrium lobby stretches 60-feet high, offering a glimpses of the modern building technology employed to allow the entire Exchange Tower to achieve LEED Platinum environmental rating.
Check-in takes place at the private second-floor reception, to which all hotel guests are escorted by a hovering check-in concierge. The elegant living-room-style salon features custom-designed Ann Saks marble floor inlay complimented with crystal, brass Moorish-designed Il Pezzo wall sconces and original art pieces.
Each room or suite in the EXchange offers customized luxury with curated custom murals, inlaid herringbone-designed hardwood floors and all-marble bathrooms with heated floors. The Patio Suite overlooks an enclosed private rooftop court with illuminated greenery walls visible through 40 linear feet of window wall.
The hotel also features Hydra Estiatorio Mediterranean — a stylish bar and restaurant named after the coveted island in Greece — expected to open in the New Year under chef Mark Greenfield’s culinary direction (Black and Blue, Coast Vancouver). The 110-seat restaurant will offer Mediterranean favorites such as grilled sea bass with roast lemon and sea salt dressed tableside or carved spit-roasted oregano lamb drizzled with fresh olive oil. The Hydra Café — the mirrored coffee bar on the heritage-lobby level — is modelled after The Philosophers Library in Greece, featuring sustainable local woodcraft shelves with wood-slab books created by a local millworker.
