For a hip staycation, try the Third Ward’s only hotel
The view from the top of the Journeyman Hotel at the corner of North Broadway and Chicago Street offers bird’s-eye vistas of 100-year-old brick warehouses and factories in Milwaukee’s Third Ward. The buildings have been renovated and turned into offices, apartments, condos, restaurants, boutiques, theater spaces and art galleries during the past 30 years, making the Historic Third Ward one of the hippest spots to live and work in the city.
From this lofty perch nine stories up at the Outsider bar (which offers both indoor and outdoor seating), you can grab a bite, sip a craft cocktail or beer, relax on a comfy bench seat next to a fire pit and play shuffleboard, cornhole or giant versions of Jenga and Connect Four.
Or, if you’re a history buff, contemplate the lives of the mostly Sicilian vendors who, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, would fill their carts with fruits and vegetables at commission houses on the streets below before heading into Milwaukee neighborhoods to to sell their produce.
Or consider the Irish immigrants or American Indians who came before the Italians and lived on this roughly triangle-shaped hunk of once boggy land that’s bordered by the Milwaukee River, Lake Michigan and I-794.
The revitalized neighborhood, listed on the National Register of Historic Places, is also home to the popular Milwaukee Public Market, the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design and the 75acre Maier Festival Park, home to Summerfest and other summer festivals.
The Journeyman, named for those who wander, is the only hotel in the Third Ward. It’s an ideal place for a visit by out-of-towners or a staycation for locals, especially if you want to take in one of the numerous Maier Park festivals.
The hotel also has a great restaurant in the Tre Rivali, with its modern Mediterranean menu created by executive chef Heather Terhune; a friendly staff, bikes you can borrow, a yoga mat in every room and a workout suite that overlooks North Broadway with large windows. Rates usually start at $249, but the hotel is running a special this summer with a $99 bargain on Sunday nights. (Be sure to mention code IENBO to get the deal.) Another perk is that the hotel is pet friendly, so you can bring your pooch, kitty or aardvark for free.
When a friend and I stayed at the Journeyman — which is managed by San Francisco-based Kimpton Hotels — we dined at the Tre Rivoli and had delicious meals of grilled swordfish and steamed mussels followed by a dessert of honey-ricotta cheesecake served with a scoop of Sicilian pistachio ice cream. Terhune said she sources from local farms as much as possible and that some of her favorites on the current menu include the olive oil-braised, charred octopus; carrot gnocchi with rabbit sausage, pea shoots and carrots; and the Middle-Eastern roasted half-chicken with golden raisin saffron couscous, apricots, tomatoes, green olives and cauliflower.
My Italian is almost nonexistent and at first blush, I thought the restaurant was named for some type of pasta. But I later learned that it means “Three Rivals” and pays homage to Milwaukee’s three founders: Solomon Juneau, Byron Kilbourn and George H. Walker.
Hotel spokeswoman Mary Kruse told me when the Kimpton team was designing the hotel several years ago, they wanted it to have a homey, friendly feel. They achieved that with the pool table just to the left of the lobby and nightly wine gatherings in a cozy space to the right.
Though it’s subtle, the entire hotel has something of a playful vibe, which is what I think the late Bill Kimpton would have liked. He told me that he was going for an “anti-stuffy” feel when I interviewed him more than 30 years ago in San Francisco at one of his first boutique hotels.
His strategy was to buy small, older buildings in downtown neighborhoods and convert them into intimate, European-style hotels. Though the Journeyman was built on the site of a former parking lot — home to a grocery store in the 1930s — it fits in with his original vision.
The stylish, 158-room urban retreat opened in June 2016. With a red-brick facade, it looks similar to the neighboring buildings that house the Broadway condominiums. They were built starting in 1893, the year after a huge fire scorched 16 blocks, burned 410 buildings and destroyed 215 freight cars. It injured dozens, killed five and made several thousand mostly Irish immigrants and their families homeless. When the rebuilding began, the wave of Italian immigration took off.
The Journeyman’s cream-colored check-in desk has wavy bombe curves that struck me as something out of “Alice In Wonderland.” The chests in the guest rooms were crafted in the same style, but are lacquered in bold red and black with engine numbers from Milwaukee’s old locomotives. There are hand-hewn wooden live edge writing desks, some of them made from salvaged wood. There’s also art from local artists and a ceramic hound to greet you. If you bring your own pooch, she will get her own bowl.
And if you’re intrigued by the Third Ward’s history, as I was, there’s no better way to learn about it than by taking a walking tour with a Historic Milwaukee guide. I tagged along with Mary McAndrews, who has been leading tours in the Third Ward for more than 20 years and has seen it turn into a creative hub and what she calls Milwaukee’s “place to be.” Tours are hosted every Saturday at 11 a.m. into October. See historicmil waukee.org.
For more details on the hotel, see journeymanhotel.com. For other things to see and do in the Third Ward, see historicthirdward.org.