By Joan Waters

Housing, offices, restaurants and stores are bringing vibrant energy to the downtown core.

926 J Street

Maybe you never really looked at it until the scaffolding went up and signs of restoration were under way, but even in its present state, 926 J St. is a knockout of a building. In 1925, it was Sacramento’s “It” address. With elegant architecture and 14 floors including a chateau-esque penthouse, it reigned as the place to do business. After World War II, however, as demographics shifted, things changed at 926. Those who know its history acknowledge a decline starting midcentury and during the dowdy decades that followed. But now the classic beauty, many of its original charms intact, is about to come roaring back, this time as a boutique hotel.
    “I think we are the only major city on the West Coast that doesn’t have a landmark hotel in a landmark building,” says Kipp Blewett of Rubicon Partners, managing partner of the 926 project. “This idea captured everybody’s imagination. The hotel was the thing that we felt we almost had to do.”
    It was a case of impeccable timing. “I had come to Sacramento for 10 years looking for a hotel to do here,” says Chip Conley, CEO of Joie de Vivre Hospitality and one of the West Coast’s hottest hoteliers. “People showed me the Elks Lodge, which didn’t work because there wasn’t enough square footage. Nine twenty-six came last year, when one of our key managers, Brian Larson, starting talking to Kipp Blewett, the developer. It quickly became apparent that we were the solution for what they imagined the building could be.”
    This will be Joie de Vivre’s 31st boutique hotel. It’s a $55 million project, with the city providing $9.8 million of assistance in the form of a $3.3 million grant for historic preservation elements, $600,000 in off-site improvements and a $5.9 million loan for the hotel. There will be 197 rooms, 11,000 square feet of small meeting spaces, the penthouse, of course, and a ground-floor restaurant (in addition to a restaurant in the hotel).
    “I think what’s exciting about Sacramento is in the 20 years we’ve been in business—and we’ve gone into Los Angeles, Napa, Silicon Valley, San Francisco—I’ve never seen as much pent-up demand and support from a community for the idea,” Conley says. Boutique hotels, as he confides, are “sophisticated little pieces of urbanity” for locals as well as guests. “This is going to be a true boutique hotel,” Blewett says. “Chip’s not coming in with any preconceived theme. He really wants this hotel to say what Sacramento is all about.” To that end, Conley recently held a series of get-togethers to talk about how the hotel could best reflect the city. “We try to create a personal product,” he says. “If we get it right, then we create deep loyalty.”
    Clearly, Conley has a gift for getting it right: Joie de Vivre hotel registers all over the state glitter with the names of rock stars and celebrities. In fact, billionaire and bon vivant Richard Branson wrote the foreword to Conley’s first book, The Rebel Rules; his second, Marketing That Matters, is due out this fall. “I can’t guarantee that, just because we open a hotel in Sacramento, Richard Branson will come here,” Conley says, “but what I can say is that if he does come, he’s sure to stay at our hotel.”

Aura, 601 Capitol Mall

Architect Daniel Libeskind, internationally famous for his edgy, unconventional designs, is about to put his signature on Sacramento’s skyline. It’s a major coup for the city. Libeskind is the official master planner for New York City’s World Trade Center site.
    Aura, a sleek, 38-story luxury condo tower going up at 601 Capitol Mall, is as striking a structure as you’d see in any major city, says Craig Nassi, the project’s Denver-based developer. “In many ways, [Libeskind] is the answer to the future of eclectic design and the rebirth of downtown Sacramento.” 
    The structure, billed as a “sculpture that changes with the light and the seasons,” will have 265 condos. Earlier this summer, about 50 were available for purchase in sizes from 746 to 1,800 square feet. (The rest have already sold.) Prices started at $480,000. A penthouse on the 37th floor was a cool $3.6 million. The building’s amenities: a pool and hot tub surrounded by lounging areas, a landscaped garden, separate his and hers spas, 24-hour concierge, valet service and a business center for meetings and special events. The building will also have two suites where residents can house their overnight visitors in style. “We build what people want,” Nassi says.

U.S. Bank Tower, 621 Capitol Mall

Sometime next month, one of the city’s flashiest new office towers will start to take shape three blocks from the state Capitol. “I think the steel delivery is in October. From there, it goes up very, very quickly,” says Ellen Warner, vice president of David S. Taylor Interests, developer of the U.S. Bank Tower at 621 Capitol Mall. The building’s 25 above-grade floors will have 366,291 rentable square feet; offices will be on floors 8 through 25. There’ll be one level of parking underground and six levels above. Plans for the ground floor include a white-tablecloth restaurant and about 23,000 square feet of retail space.
    The building will be “smart” from top to bottom, but it’s the lobby that will steal the show. At an unprecedented seven stories, it will be brilliantly lighted and offer a clear view of the state Capitol. “It’s an amazing design, unique to Sacramento,” Warner says. “To have a lobby where everyone who walks in has this completely open vista to the outside? There is no other building like it. It’s a special urban design feature, and once you are in, you will certainly know you are on Capitol Mall.”
    With all that light and space in the lobby, of course, there’s talk of art. “It’s an amazing opportunity,” Warner says. “We have an art selection committee, and we are working with the Sacramento Metropolitan Arts Commission as well.”
    When the $110 million project is completed sometime in 2008, estimates are that it will bring about 3,500 people to Capitol Mall every day. “It’s a world-class building that could be in any big city anywhere in the world: San Francisco, New York, Hong Kong. It’s that level of sophistication and quality,” Warner says. So is there a chance she’ll have an office there? “I sure would love to,” she says. “It’s going to be the coolest building in town.”

K Street’s 700 Block

If all goes well, about this time next year you may be doing something you’ve heard about, but have never actually done yourself: shop on K Street’s 700 block. 
    On June 13, the City Council approved a $21.6 million project (excluding land costs). The city will contribute $4 million, and a development team led by Zeiden Properties will provide the rest in equity and private loans. “This is going to be a great, great project for the city of Sacramento and [is] way overdue, way overdue,” said Joe Zeiden at the City Council meeting. Zeiden and his brother and sister own 82 Z Gallerie stores, including one at Sacramento’s Downtown Plaza. “It’s a diamond in the rough,” Zeiden said of the 700 block. “We’re going to clean it up and make it shine.” Historic façades will be restored and 52,000 square feet of shops and restaurants will showcase “urban destination retail,” which local urban planner Wendy Hoyt defines as stores you won’t find anywhere else in the city. There’ll be a Z Gallerie, of course, along with two other yet-to-be-named flagship stores, each with more than 4,000 square feet. A list of interested merchants for the remainder of the ground-floor retail includes Anthropologie, American Apparel, Urban Outfitters and Sur La Table. Plans call for office space or housing on the second floor. “All these buildings were built in the early 1900s, and Joe wants to restore them,” Hoyt says. “He’s done other historic projects, so you could say this is a passion for him.”
         

K Street’s 800 Block

Big changes also are afoot for the 800 block. “We’re hoping it will have retail downstairs and housing above,” says Mayor Heather Fargo about the proposed mixed-use development by John Saca. “How tall, and what it’s going to look like, are still being worked on. That’s going to come back to us (the City Council) pretty soon.”
So when will we start seeing a change? “We are working on an environmental impact report for the project,” says the city’s Economic Development director, Leslie Fritzsche. The project will total about 1 million square feet. On the drawing board are at least two options: 300 residential units with 150,000 square feet of office space and 600 residential units with no office space. “Plans are quite fluid at this point,” says Fritzsche. Stay tuned.

10th and K Streets

Imagine this: going for dinner, drinks and a live theatrical performance on K Street. Oh, yeah, it could happen. “We went before Council about a year ago with a different proposal, and they asked their staff to study performing arts options. That took a couple of months, but we think this one really hits the nail on the head,” says Ellen Warner, vice president of David S. Taylor Interests. The proposal covers the transformation of parcels at the southeast corner of 10th and K from a collection of shuttered storefronts into a restaurant/entertainment destination. Among the properties is the vacant, but very solid, two-story Woolworth building. “What we are envisioning for the building is primarily mixed use, including a theater/cabaret that has eight live performances a week, 50 weeks a year, so it is busy,” says Warner, adding that the shows would be long-running, on the order of San Francisco’s Beach Blanket Babylon. “This is in cities like Denver, Milwaukee, Pittsburgh, and it’s been very, very successful, but it’s not here yet at all,” she adds. The project’s restaurant partner is Randy Paragary. “He knows what works and what doesn’t,” Warner says. “Here, we’re envisioning something like a marriage between Cheesecake Factory-style and Broadway deli. It will be fresh, hearty American food.” There also are plans for spacious lounge areas, a big bar upstairs and another on the ground level. “It will be a lively, fun environment,” says Warner.

This article appears in the December 2009 issue of Sacramento Magazine.