Tucked into downtown Davis is The Vine Inn, a former Econo Lodge built in the early ’60s. It’s now a midcentury-modern boutique hotel walkable to all the good stuff: galleries, restaurants, bars, shopping and good coffee.
Tim Warren has owned the hotel for 35 years. When remodeling started in 2018, he renamed it The Vine Inn for a fresh start.
“I didn’t know really how it was going to turn out—I kinda crossed my fingers about it,” says Warren. “There aren’t many examples of these older properties left anymore, as a lot of them have been knocked down to make room for something else. So I thought, let’s gut it out and start fresh with an eye toward not trying to be like a new chain hotel, but taking what we have and embracing that.”
It doesn’t have the harvest gold and avocado green color scheme of our grandparents’ living rooms. The Vine Inn offers a lovely interpretation of mid-mod features: sleek, clean lines and calm, uncluttered rooms with wood tones and natural hues with pops of color that pay homage to the past with an unmistakable modern flair.
“I didn’t want to make it too over the top because then it gets kind of kitschy,” says Warren. “I didn’t want to go too far with it.”
The project was completed in March 2020. Then COVID-19 hit. “COVID really put the brakes on everything. But we’ve been here a long time, so we perservered,” says Warren. “We’ve been doing very well and I’m so very grateful for that.”
What’s Warren’s favorite thing about the remodel?
“I like the positive feedback for the midcentury-modern look, when people say it’s ‘groovy.’ I wanted it to be something that anyone would look at and think it’s nice, but also for younger people to experience a hotel in Davis without it being a chain. In a town such as Davis—a kind of artsy university town—it’s the type of thing that fits very well.”
The Vine Inn
221 D St., Davis;
(530) 756-1040;
thevineinndavis.com
