Canopy by Hilton Memphis Hotel

164 Union Avenue, Memphis, Tennessee 38103, USA United States

Building Area (sf): 117,101

Completion: July 2020

Architect of Record:

HBG Design

Danny Valle, AIA – Principal-in-Charge / Project Manager
Nathan Peak, AIA – Principal / Design Director / Lead Architectural Designer
Thor Harland – Lead Architectural Designer
Rodger Conine, AIA – Lead Project Architect
Steve Trott, AIA – Project Architect
Paul Towery, AIA, ICC Certified – Codes
Ken Hudson, AIA – Construction Administration

• Owner/Client:
• General Contractor: Montgomery Martin
• Electrical: Interior Designer: Sawyer & Company (formerly Krause + Sawyer)
  Mechanical and Plumbing Engineer: Haltom Engineering
  Electrical Engineer: Canup Engineering
  Structural Engineer: Chad Stewart & Associates
  Lighting Designer: Benya Burnett Consultancy
  Food Service Consultant: Fred Schmid & Associates LLC
  Photographer: Nick McGinn Photography and Dero Sanford/ThinkDero Photography
  
• Engineering:
  
• Other:
  
• Photography:
  1 - This active downtown Memphis intersection serves as an important gateway into the urban core and to historic, world-famous attractions. Photography by Dero Sanford / Think Dero Architectural Photography
  2 - Forming a distinct first impression for visitors, the new Canopy by Hilton provides the design aesthetic and atmospheric prominence this marquee corner location has needed for years. Photography by Nick McGinn
  3 - The hotel’s materials, proportions and scale are meant to evoke characteristics of the existing network of mid-rise masonry architecture in the downtown area. Photography by Nick McGinn
  4 - Photography by Nick McGinn
  5 - Photography by Dero Sanford / Think Dero Architectural Photography
  6 - Photography by Nick McGinn
  7 - Photography by Nick McGinn
  8 - Photography by Dero Sanford / Think Dero Architectural Photography
  9 - Site Plan
  10 - Design Thinking
  

Sited at a main entry point into downtown Memphis’ historic entertainment district, this contemporary lifestyle hotel evolves the urban context with discerningly rebellious architectural moves.

Situated at a marquee corner into downtown Memphis’ urban center and its historic, world-famous attractions, the new Canopy by Hilton hotel is the long-awaited redevelopment of a dilapidated former 50’s era hotel structure and site that remained vacant and unoccupied for 20 years.

The previous hotel structure and the site were initially viewed as being of limited interest to prospective tenants; some even considered it to be urban blight. Through a new lens, the Canopy hotel project and design unveiled opportunities to bring out unique characteristics that speak to the city’s identity as it is today, ultimately creating enormous community impact at this prominent urban gateway.

The hotel’s design and construction were extremely complex to navigate given the Owner’s desire to keep existing building structures and foundations from its previous hotel incarnation. The conflicting structural challenges were ultimately transformed into useful square footage and its solution informed a simplified hotel geometry and a comprehensive expression that created a unique dichotomy between upper and lower floor masses.

The project consists of a 171,100 square foot hotel block elevated above a visually transparent podium level and one level of subterranean parking. The hotel block maximizes the site’s guestroom potential through a double-loaded guestroom corridor ring surrounding an internal light well. A sense of transparency and natural daylighting in the hotel’s base level is achieved through floor to ceiling storefront systems along the South and East edges and two large skylights located under the light well that amplify the restaurant, lounge, and bar amenities at the first level.

Downtown Memphis architecture has a long history with rows of ornate brick hotel, office and warehouse buildings lining the streets. The materials, proportion, scale and well composed fenestrations of the new Canopy hotel evoke these characteristics yet serve as an evolution of the urban context composed as a building of its time.

Brick was an important material for continuity, but the size and type of the brick is updated in a stacked bond pattern. It’s these subtle design deviations and the overall geometry of the heavy upper floor mass floating above the open public space below that help to differentiate the design from its neighbors.

A dark charcoal gray palette and simplification of form further distinguishes the building and contemporizes the visual aesthetic of the architecture in a discerningly rebellious manner. The Avant Garde solution is created through rigorous historic, aesthetic, and structural investigation and is a direct reaction to the project’s context and objectives.