Keating Hotel

In the fast lane

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When real estate developer Edward Kaen decided to open a high-end boutique hotel in San Diego, something he felt the city had been lacking, not any design firm would do. “I wanted to differentiate my hotel from all the other hotels in town and I figured why not get the Ferrari of design firms,” says the neophyte hotelier. And he did so, literally: he chose Italian firm Pininfarina, best known for creating the sexy look of Ferraris and Maseratis. “Seeing what they have done with cars, I wanted them to do to hotels with the Keating,” adds Kaen, whose admiration for the designers started more than three years ago when he was contemplating buying his own Ferrari.

The Italians had turned down previous hotel offers, but this project, also their first for ay into hospitality, intrigued them. “First, I was attracted by the fact that this project was completely new. Innovation is one of the most important features of a successful design project,” says Paolo Pininfarina, CEO, Pininfarina Extra, the division of the company that specializes in product and interior design. “Also, San Diego is a dynamic city, an optimal site for a project of this kind.”

The designers successfully translated their signature ergonomic, clean car design into a modern, yet intimate hotel with sleek custom furniture and a bold color palette of red, black, and white. “White means brighter light, typical of almost every day in San Diego ,” Pininfarina explains. “Black is trendy, elegant, and contemporary, and red means sensuality, Italian passion, and style.” The entire lobby is wrapped in red; textured hallway walls are painted black and lined with a red plush custom carpet stamped with hotel’s simple rectangular logo; and through the red 35 guestroom doors are white walls, logo-bearing red area rugs, exclusive Bang & Olufsen electronics (another first for the industry), and high beds featuring a wooden headboard, red throw, and custom drawers for ample storage. And the rooms have an airy feel thanks to doorless bathrooms: a glass wall is the only thing that separates the bedroom and the large blue resin walled showe r (open on both sides); blue resin sinks (“the color of the San Diego sky,” says Pininfarina) and brushed stainless steel counters and fixtures, “the symbol of Italian craftsmanship,” he adds, adorn the other side of the wall.

Since the hotel is housed in a historic 1890 Romanesque building (it’s named the Keating and one of the oldest in the city), the designers wanted to mix pieces of the building’s heritage with their modern design. They kept and enhanced the original entrance; the existing handrail of the lob by ’s grand staircase was restored as was the mahogany windows in the stairwell; and exposed brick decorates guestrooms. “The theme behind the hotel was to take the 1890 building and transform it into a 2007 hotel, [without] fo r getting what it once was,” Kaen says. “It’s the mixing of the old meets new.”

Up next for the hotel: a subterranean lounge and restaurant, as well as a suite with an outdoor garden area complete with ivy and a hot tub.