BRAVO TO BLACKSTONE for restoring and reinvigorating the Alonzo Ward Hotel.

    Reputedly haunted by friendly spirits, the hotel building and its rooms and other spaces were morphing into sad ghosts of their former glories. Oh, back in the day! This is a place where Sitting Bull and John Kennedy slept. It is where Duke Ellington performed and where Jack Benny recorded a live radio broadcast. But by the 1980s the Ward was shrinking into blandness, disrepair and worse.

    Several years ago Blackstone undertook the massive and sorely needed task of hotel restoration. One of their smart decisions included hiring local interior designer Michelle Williams to help resurrect parts of the building. Michelle leapt at the opportunity. Her friend Marianne Stenvig operates the hotel’s bar, restaurant and ballroom, and Michelle had spent a lot of time inside the historic hotel dreaming of its yesteryears.

    Her first assignment was to coax the worn-out ballroom back to life. New carpets, wall colors, drapes and furnishings and a total cleanup were part of the effort. But the real test is in the details and that is where Michelle’s work really shines. Visit the ballroom and look closely at subtle touches like the medallions on the ceiling or wall embellishments near the bar. We can enjoy it all thanks to her.

    Among the proudest aspects of her work inside the hotel are the warm, inviting paint choices for Alonzo’s, the swanky main floor café. “The floors are so beautiful,” she explained. “So I worked off those, and used the floor’s colors as the basis for the rest of the room.”

    To locate unique furnishings, Michelle asked for and was offered access to the entire hotel. “It was like a giant scavenger hunt,” she said, as her eyes targeted a small mirror on the wall of the bar. “I found that mirror in one of the dingy hotel rooms that no longer exists. I found all sorts of things in all corners of the hotel to use in the ballroom and in here, too. There were lots of neat mirrors and lamps and furniture. I had a license to explore all over the place, and I did. I even found furniture in the basement, in what used to be a speakeasy bar.”

    The newly recreated ambience of the Ward returns the status of what Michelle calls “The Queen of Main Street.” Aberdeen, she emphasized, is fortunate to have a place like the Ward. “The hotel offers a great story and real elegance to the community.”

    Thanks, Michelle, for caring about Aberdeen, and for improving the aesthetics and livability of our community.

 
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