Hotel Lucile opens in Silver Lake after 7-year church restoration

A building that has stood in Los Angeles for nearly a century is welcoming visitors in an entirely new way after an extensive restoration.

The former Bethany Presbyterian Church, built in 1931 in the city’s Silver Lake neighborhood, has been converted into Hotel Lucile, a 25-room boutique hotel with a courtyard cocktail pool that opened Sept. 14, according to a hotel news release shared with Fox News Digital.

The property has taken on several roles over the decades. After operating as a church, it was later used as a theater and an antique market before being converted into a hotel, according to the release.

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The latest transformation was about seven and a half years in the making, Anthony Gutierrez, opening general manager of Hotel Lucile, told Fox News Digital.

The restoration focused on finding a new use for the building while maintaining elements that date to its time as a house of worship, Gutierrez said.

Many of the church’s original features remain throughout the property, including stained-glass windows, wooden beams, high ceilings and steel-framed windows.

One of the biggest transformations took place inside the former chapel, which now serves as the hotel’s restaurant and dining room.

“Literally just about every aspect of the chapel itself was preserved,” Gutierrez said, pointing to the original wood flooring, beams and stained-glass windows.

Preserving those features while preparing the building for its new use required extensive work, Gutierrez said. Crews removed the chapel’s original wood flooring to install modern electrical and plumbing systems and add soundproofing for the guest rooms before putting the flooring back into place.

“For the dining room itself, it is as original as it can be,” he said, estimating that about 90% of the space remains original.

Working with a building approaching 100 years old also presented challenges throughout the years-long redevelopment.

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“We had surprises up until the day when we received our certificate of occupancy,” Gutierrez said. “It was not an easy journey.”

Meeting modern requirements while trying to preserve the building’s original architectural elements made parts of the restoration a “painstaking” process, he added.

The building’s latest chapter also includes an art collection, with two large hand-painted murals in the former chapel and other works displayed throughout the property.

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Some pieces are part of a permanent collection, while others are available for purchase, Gutierrez said.

Along with preserving elements of the former church, the property has introduced modern touches, including an Erewhon-curated minibar and a roving martini cart that makes its rounds each evening, according to the release.

Gutierrez said the combination of old and new can offer travelers something different from a traditional hotel experience.

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“There is some comfort in things being the same, but taking even a small risk of just going somewhere different and experiencing something different can really bring kind of a highlight to a trip or even a staycation,” he said.