If you ever had to go to the bathroom while dining at Perennial, you quickly realized that the hotel building it sat in was an empty, Shining-like husk, plans for its renovation into a boutique hotel having fallen apart financially. More recently, in Perennial Virant times, it’s been a construction zone as those plans finally proceeded again. Now at last the revitalized Hotel Lincoln will open March 8 as a chic 184-room hotel overlooking Lincoln Park and Lake Michigan. Already home to one of the best-liked mid-priced restaurants in town, it will offer other food and drink amenities in the coming months. Besides room service (room service from Paul Virant! How much better does it get?) there will be Elaine’s Coffee Call, a European-style coffee bar featuring La Colombe coffee and a daily selection of pastries from the Perennial Virant pastry kitchen. Then, in June, the hotel will open a rooftop lounge overlooking the park, the lake and downtown, with capacity to seat 175 outdoors and 75 indoors, serving bar snacks and craft cocktails designed by Chef Virant and crew. Find out more about the hotel here, or watch the video they sent out below.
