The beds are made, the pool awaits, the kitchen is stocked.
Akron’s first new downtown hotel in decades, the Northside Courtyard by Marriott, is set to open Thursday.
The opening comes four months later than planned and more than five years after local developer Joel Testa initially revealed his ambitious plans for a 10-story Marriott Courtyard on downtown’s northern edge.
“It’s hard to believe,” Testa said of the Thursday debut of the $25 million hotel with its mod, cozy furniture and spaces mimicking boutique hotels found in larger cities.
“I was looking at some of the rooms the other night ... and it’s sort of surreal.”
A handful of the 146 rooms are suites that Testa designed himself. They’re apartment, or loft-style rooms with exposed brick walls, a living area, 1½ bathrooms and views of the downtown skyline.
“They are unlike anything Marriott does,” Testa said, noting that the rooms are inspired by his neighboring Northside Lofts condominiums.
The hotel, he said, is a key part of his vision for the Northside district downtown, home to Luigi’s restaurant as well as the Zeber-Martell studio/gallery.
“This mixed-use, urban, Manhattan-style area downtown has existed in my brain back to about 1997,” he said.
Next up: the opening later this month of the Northside Speakeasy, a small bar with a cozy decor inspired by the secret places for boozing during Prohibition.
While the Northside Speakeasy is in a corner of the ground floor of the hotel, it is not a hotel operation. Rather, the bar is owned by the Byte Dining Group — a partnership that counts Testa and well-known Cleveland chef Dante Boccuzzi among its members.
Plenty of amenities
The 146-room hotel boasts pull-out desks on wheels, a streamlined decor, including light color finishes, walk-in showers and “spa-style” sinks on wood stands.
The hotel operates The Bistro in the ground-floor lobby. It features a curving counter where customers — hotel guests as well as the general public — can buy food and alcoholic and non-alchoholic beverages. Breakfast and dinner will be available.
As at other Marriott Coutyards, Starbucks coffee and espresso drinks will be sold; Testa anticipates the Starbucks being a big hit with nearby downtown workers.
The lobby area — which features complimentary Wi-Fi — includes “media pods,” where guests can watch individual TV screens, as well as communal tables with charging stations and a kiosk where guests can print airline boarding passes and check flight status.
Cindy Sherman, sales and marketing manager for the hotel, said its all about getting hotel guests out of their rooms, so they don’t get that “stuck in their room,” isolated feeling.
Sherman works for Concord Hospitality Enterprises, the Raleigh, N.C., company, which manages the hotel and is part-owner. The other owner is Testa & Associates LLC, part of Testa Cos. of Cuyahoga Falls. Joel Testa is president of the family-owned Testa Cos; his father, Paul, is CEO.
The lobby space is light and airy, with a color palette of grays, browns and gray-blue and a wall of windows with a view of the Northside Lofts residential and retail complex. The hotel’s exterior mimics this development.
Off the main lobby area is a lounge/business center with comfy seating and a wall boasting a large photograph of rows of blue seats at Canal Park stadium in downtown Akron. Local photographer Shane Wynn took that picture and some others in the hotel; the pictures are available via an online archive that is available for free use by anyone.
Other local images — such as one of a Goodyear blimp and another of Derby Downs — hang elsewhere on the ground floor.
Joel Testa photographed images of Akron’s All-America Bridge that hang in the guest room bathrooms.
The ground floor includes a 20-seat private movie theater — complete with stadium-style seating featuring big, comfy leather recliners that boast cup holders and removable trays. Nearby, is a conference room and two banquet rooms, each also with a wall of windows.
Below street-level is a swimming pool and a fitness room with weight machines.
Testa said the delayed opening is due to routine construction delays. Additionally, there was water damage, now repaired, caused by a malfunction in a shower head.
Testa plans to further add to the Northside attractions by opening a new restaurant, Dante’s Inferno, a new Byte Dining Group venture that will feature pizza baked in a wood-fired oven and other Italian eats. The restaurant will be housed in a freestanding glass structure that will be built on the lower level of the patio in between the hotel and Northside Lofts. This eatery is an offshot of DBA at Northside Lofts.
Katie Byard can be reached at 330-996-3781 or kbyard@thebeaconjournal.com. You can follow her @KatieByardABJ on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook at www.facebook.com.