Houston Chronicle Sunday

The Lancaster gets hip

- By MOLLY GLENTZER

newly not Hurst, throughout There’s New just collection reopened have owner due drama the given to Jay of the boutique Lancaster contempora­ry throughout star Shinn historic billing and hotel landmark’s Hotel to his Houston’s that their Texas partner, — and occupies impressive art facelift. it’s Tim a Jones James, prime Large Hall Mark Theater works and Flood by the District Donald Alley and Donald location Theatre. Judd, Moffett Terrell beside greet lobby hung salon-style visitors. Numerous beneath smaller the staircase. pieces In are the include expanded series by mezzanine, Luis Jimenez the attraction­s and Joseph Havel, a textile collage by Robert Rauschenbe­rg, a drawing by Trenton Doyle Hancock and a newly commission­ed wall sculpture by Margo Sawyer. When the TV cabinet is closed, a pair of Tom Orr videos on the doors mimic waterfalls. The show continues, more privately, in each guest room. Shinn’s own light-based work hangs in several places, including Cultivated F +B, the hotel’s reborn restaurant. His family has long been in the hotel business, but he and Hurst were surprised to learn during a visit with a New York broker last year that the Lancaster was available. The oldest continuall­y operating hotel in Houston, the historic property had been in the Lusk family for four generation­s, since 1926. Shinn immediatel­y saw the boutique property, with its 93 rooms, as a place to showcase and expand upon his art collection, which numbers more than 200 pieces spanning 40 years. It’s a virtual who’s who of the state’s living artists. While some of what hangs at the Lancaster had been in storage, a lot came from the home Shinn and Hurst share at One Arts, a high-rise in the Dallas Arts District. “We have a lot of empty walls now,” Hurst said. The sale closed in July 2017. A month later, Hurricane Harvey completely submerged the building’s basement, which held computers, laundry facilities and other operating necessitie­s; and the flooding rose about 4 feet on the ground floor. That unexpected “welcome to Houston” catastroph­e forced more of an upgrade than Shinn and Hurst had planned. Interior designer David Cadwallade­r has given the once dark, English décor a Regency sensibilit­y, traditiona­l but with a little bit of punch, to let the art speak for itself. White marble gleams throughout the ground floor, giving way to calm silver-gray upholstery and carpets on upper floors. Expanded windows bring in more light, and the enlarged mezzanine features a conference room, a dining area and a gourmet breakfast bar. All of it art-filled. Unfortunat­ely, the original lobby’s beloved photograph­ic mural of two famous guests — actress Betty Rand and her horse Phantom, who visited together in 1927 — didn’t survive Harvey. But Shinn and Hurst have hung a small print of that legendary moment among other vintage images that honor the Lancaster’s storied past. REINVENTED OPPOSITE HOUSTON'S HOTEL, LONG PAGE: AS THEATER A AN THE HIP UNDERSTATE­D HISTORIC AND DISTRICT, ART-FILLED LANCASTER HAS GEM BEEN SPOT. IN ABOVE LEFT: ARTIST MARK FLOOD'S “OUTCROP” PAINTING IS HUNG AT LANCASTER HOTEL'S NEWLY RENOVATED LOBBY. ABOVE: A SERIES OF PRINTS BY DONALD JUDD IS AMONG WORKS ON VIEW IN THE LANCASTER’S LOBBY.

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