To respond to both Nashville’s music industry roots and its evolving landscape, Dallas firm Studio 11 Design wanted the Hutton Hotel to be a “home away from home for endless stars and musicians,” explains principal Kellie Sirna. “It was and is Nashville’s original boutique hotel. We aimed to honor that while enhancing its offerings to the creative community.” The renovation for owner Carey Watermark Investors included a refresh of the 250 guestrooms, as well as the addition of several new public spaces, including Analog, a 5,000-square-foot performance venue built on the site of the hotel’s old parking facilities. “Analog was born from a need for artists to feel safe and at home in a space that inspires them,” she says. Jewel tones and rugs sourced from Istanbul impart a relaxed, intimate vibe that suggests guests have stumbled into a jam session in a musician’s living room.
In the hotel proper, the relaunched restaurant, now called WestEnd Kitchen & Bar, features a sophisticated palette of vivid orange and charcoal-navy with brass fixtures and a feature wall papered in a William Morris-ish jungle print in citrus hues. Also new are a pair of Writers Rooms, creative spaces designed with the input of musicians Ryan Tedder of OneRepublic and country crooner Dierks Bentley. “We loved inventing these spaces to ensure that the artists’ stories were told,” says Sirna. Inspired by Bentley’s Arizona roots, the West room is outfitted in Saltillo tile and Navajo area rugs and boasts a sound booth. Tedder’s design, redolent of an urban loft, offers abundant natural light with a camel saddle in one corner that “invites guests to kick off their boots and relax,” she observes.
Lest anyone forget the visual and applied arts, the hotel offers a vigorous program that includes different corridor artwork on every floor in a variety of media—led by the firm’s Lou Verne team. “From collaging and embroidering to refinishing piano keys and painting drumheads, our designers and architects were able to use their other creative talents to leave their mark,” says senior project manager Greer May.
