The Royal hotel has been reborn in the historic town of Picton, located in Ontario’s Prince Edward County. Following a thorough revitalization led by Toronto architecture studio Giannone Petricone Associates, the Victorian landmark returns to its original radiance, complete with 28 guestrooms, a café, three bars, a fine-dining restaurant, fitness center, and spa overlooking the garden terrace.
Embracing the quintessential tropes of a Victorian railway hotel, the redesign lives up to the hotel’s name through a variety of elements that highlight—or reinterpret—British design traditions while nodding to the bucolic setting. “The local context is largely an agricultural one, but it’s also the character of Picton’s Main Street and the longstanding traditions associated with a Victorian railway hotel,” says Giannone Petricone principal Pina Petricone. “Apples, pears, mushrooms, ducks, and chickens punctuate the hotel experience with the intention of distancing it from the building’s British Loyalist history, bringing it strongly into a new currency that aims to create great texture, albeit one that is slow and relaxed.”
Wood, stone, metal, and concrete form the Royal’s updated materiality, which is ripe with eye-catching flourishes—from terracotta cove tiles on the ground floor to leather hides that adorn concrete foundations. An undulating fireplace echoes the form of starched white linen in the parlor, while slot-seam leather wraps one of the bar counters. From the garden terrace, guests can glimpse upon a fourth onsite bar and fireplace patio nearby by the swimming pool.
Around the corner, former horse stables were transformed into the Royal Annex, where five suites are housed. Accommodations are defined by white oak surfaces that articulate corduroy panels, layered bold patterns, and wide plank herringbone flooring. In the bathrooms, custom stone tartan mosaics recall the colorways of the hotel’s façade, and vanities are designed as stone tablecloths complete with scalloped edges.
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