DLTA's former Ace Hotel is reborn as a 'creative hub' — and yes, you can still sleep there

The historical 1920s operation that erstwhile housed the beloved Ace Hotel is entering a caller epoch conscionable successful clip for the summer.

Two years aft opening successful the iconic Spanish Gothic gathering connected South Broadway, Stile Downtown Los Angeles has unveiled its multimillion-dollar renovation and its enlargement from a limited-service edifice to a afloat “creative hub.” The makeover adds a 24/7 membership-based originative laboratory with state-of-the-art euphony studios, co-working lounges, an updated rooftop barroom called Somewhere Special, a restored theatre and a curated retail store for the community.

“We don’t truly privation to telephone it conscionable a edifice — it’s much of a hub,” says Jaisun Ihm, CEO of AJU Continuum, the concern institution that purchased the historical space.

Throughout the abstraction are throwback touches — for instance, edifice guests tin get a Walkman and browse the curated cassette room with titles similar Sade’s “Promise,” Paula Abdul’s “Forever Your Girl” and the Isley Brothers’ “Between the Sheets.”

Behind the monolithic overhaul is South Korea-based AJU Continuum, which purchased the spot successful 2019 but didn’t alteration the sanction until 2024. The task marks the concern company’s archetypal U.S. expansion.

“We don’t truly privation to telephone it conscionable a edifice — it’s much of a hub,” says Jaisun Ihm, CEO of AJU Continuum, which is champion known for its culture-forward Ryse Hotel successful Seoul. With Stile, Ihm says their ngo was to “connect L.A. to Seoul.”

Ryse, Ihm says, encapsulates today’s eclectic manner hotel: “It’s grounded successful thoroughfare culture. We accidental it’s iconoclastic. It’s youthful successful nature.”

AJU Continuum teamed up with L.A. architecture and interior plan workplace Design, Bitches — the radical down the chic Checker Hall successful Highland Park and Verve Coffee Roasters successful the Arts District. Ihm didn’t attraction that it was Design, Bitches’ archetypal edifice venture. After moving with respective firms implicit the years, helium was bushed of seeing the aforesaid aesthetic everyplace and wanted to enactment with a squad that would bring a “bold” perspective, helium says.

When the creatives astatine Design, Bitches got the invitation, they were each in. “I’ve ever wanted to bash a hotel,” says RA Rudolph, the studio’s co-founder. “I emotion hotels and I person opinions,” she adds laughing.

For Angelenos who frequented the Ace Hotel, a maverick venue that helped revitalize downtown L.A. for a decennary opening successful 2014, walking done Stile volition consciousness some acquainted and new. While the building’s bones stay intact — a request of its historic-cultural monument designation — the abstraction has an industrial-modern twist inspired by L.A.’s originative spirit.

For example, the United Theater connected Broadway, which was erstwhile the 1927 flagship movie palace for the influential United Artists corporate (Mary Pickford, Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks and D.W. Griffith), present features caller carpet, modernized dependable and signifier instrumentality and astir 125 caller airy fixtures inspired by the lobby’s archetypal Spanish Revival-style chandelier. As a motion to the building’s legacy, wherever Hollywood’s earliest icons broke distant from large studios to power their ain work, AJU Continuum has launched its ain in-house booking squad for the unrecorded amusement venue. Also, the elephantine neon “Jesus Saves” motion that has sat atop the gathering since its days arsenic a religion is inactive determination — and the owners person nary plans to region it.

Some of the astir important changes tin beryllium recovered successful the edifice lobby, which features a curated convenience store called the Goodie Shop, which is adorned with throwback boomboxes. Located adjacent to the beforehand desk, which was importantly condensed, the store is filled with a enactment of California-sourced snacks and beverages, manner goods, Stile-branded merch and question essentials (phone chargers, toothpaste, hairsbreadth care, etc.).

On the other broadside of the lobby is SparkHouse, a backstage members nine and originative hub for up-and-coming musicians and creatives. The two-story abstraction features nonrecreational signaling studios, podcast and video suites, co-working lounges and gathering spaces, which are slated to unfastened by aboriginal adjacent twelvemonth erstwhile permits are approved, Ihm says. SparkHouse’s cafe and barroom is unfastened to the nationalist and sells tea, java (try the chromatic matcha latte), wine, brew cocktails and tiny bites. Ihm says programming astatine SparkHouse volition see listening sessions, unrecorded showcases and adjacent a mentorship programme for rising artists.

“I’ve ever wanted to bash a hotel,” says RA Rudolph, the co-founder of Design, Bitches.

The rooftop bar, which offers stunning skyline views of the metropolis and a pool, is present called Somewhere Special. The plan squad removed astir 90% of the plants that utilized to battalion the country to maximize abstraction for dancing and mingling. Also, the excavation area, present painted successful a playful shadiness called Carrot Orange, has much seating and a photograph booth nearby.

All 182 impermanent rooms were fixed a caller overgarment of dusty roseate paint, caller customized carpet, furnishings and upgraded bathrooms. In each room, you’ll find Korean amenities similar look masks, a customized robe by a section marque called Room Service Los Angeles and books from the erstwhile Los Angeles University Cathedral that occupied the abstraction from 1991 to 2011. With the edifice motto being “stay by your ain rules,” Rudolph says it was important for them to marque the rooms adaptable to each guest’s needs and to prioritize comfort. The effect is uncommon country layouts similar the tri-suite king country equipped with 2 twin-sized beds and a king furniture divided by a privateness divider that doubles arsenic a playful creation installation. Rudolph, who utilized to question often with her now-adult children, says that’s the benignant of country she ever wished had existed.

Stile’s accomplishment comes astatine a precarious infinitesimal for downtown L.A. In caller years, the neighborhood’s erstwhile buzzy hospitality and nightlife country has experienced dwindling ft traffic, dilatory pandemic betterment and accrued vacancies. Some concern owners accidental transgression and neglect are driving distant customers. Nearly 1,000 businesses near downtown successful 2024. Launching a high-concept manner edifice is simply a bold gamble.

The Goodie Shop, a caller curated convenience store, is filled with a enactment of California-sourced snacks and beverages, manner goods and question essentials.

But Ihm says helium hopes that Stile volition assistance rejuvenate the country and make an ecosystem that volition enactment neighboring businesses arsenic well. Rudolph says she’s already starting to spot that change.

“It’s been bully to spot that successful the past twelvemonth that I’ve been coming present to enactment connected the project, it’s livened backmost up again,” she says. “Especially this block, it feels better.”