A historic Palo Alto building reopens with rare rooftop bar

The interior of the Graduate Palo Alto. (Courtesy Graduate Palo Alto)
The interior of the Graduate Palo Alto. (Courtesy Graduate Palo Alto)

Graduate Palo Alto has converted 75 former apartment units into 100 hotel rooms and added two dining options, including a cafe on the ground floor named Lou & Herbert’s and a charming rooftop bar called President’s Terrace. President’s Terrace will add to Palo Alto’s bustling restaurant scene along University Avenue and neighboring streets, while also offering a rare rooftop bar space in the Peninsula.

Los Angeles mixologist Bad Birdy curates the vibrant cocktail program, which is paired with a small bites menu expected to showcase local seafood options like oysters. At Lou & Herbert’s, guests will similarly find a selection of mixed drinks along with coffee from Saint Frank and pastries by Manresa Bread.

Reviving the storied hotel was a tedious endeavor, Weprin admitted. The building fell into poor shape over years of neglect and required Adventurous Journeys Capital Partners, the real estate company that owns Graduate Hotels, to make significant infrastructure upgrades. When Adventurous Journeys purchased Hotel President in 2018 for $65 million, it was tasked with seismic retrofitting, updating electrical, and adding new plumbing, among other requirements that accounted for the bulk of its budget.

Adventurous Journeys also restored and preserved aspects of the building’s physical appearance. The original Hotel President sign at the main entrance will remain intact, along with other exterior features that have gone untouched, like the building’s stucco facade and its original windows. Hotel President’s lobby, its original elevator and central staircase were also restored in the process. Weprin said that every accommodation was given a facelift and decorated with artwork that pay homage to the Bay Area.

“In every room you’ll see different art pieces,” Weprin said. “We referenced a lot of Stanford alumni like Sigourney Weaver, John Macaro and John Steinbach. We also did a cool ‘Of Mice and Men’ cover.”

A dazzling hotel named after Hoover

Hotel President received much praise when it opened as a vast apartment-hotel in 1930. At the time of opening, it was considered Palo Alto’s largest hostelry and named Hotel President in honor of President Herbert Hoover, who attended Stanford University.
 
Architect Birge Clark, who eventually worked on about 450 buildings around Palo Alto, designed Hotel President in the popular Spanish colonial revival style that was ubiquitous with other structures in town during the 1920s. Notably, the apartment-hotel had decorative Spanish tiles featured on the staircase, a classic wood-beamed ceiling, chandeliers and other details scattered throughout.

Construction for the building began in 1929 and cost managing owner J. Mort Blackburn about $340,000 to complete (about $5,919,400 today), according to historic newspapers. Upon opening, Hotel President had about 125 rooms, which included apartment units among the regular hotel accommodations.

The six-story building offered two- and three-bedroom apartments at $57.50 and $65 per month, respectively, while hotel rooms were priced at a daily rate of $3.50 in 1930. Adjusted for inflation today, guests seeking accommodations at Hotel President would pay a low price of $17.83 per day.
 
When Blackburn drafted his apartment-hotel, he made sure to incorporate spacious accommodations that featured radio service in every bedroom. Moreover, Hotel President was designed specifically with local college students in mind.
 
“After various real estate and garage ventures … he sensed the need of an apartment-hotel, perhaps because he so often found the Stanford students searching for a suitable transient home for their visiting parents,” the Peninsula Times Tribune wrote about Blackburn in 1930.

But by the late 1950s, Hotel President began to lose its luster. As major hotel chains began to debut around city airports, smaller hotels like Hotel President couldn’t keep up with the competition, Palo Alto History writes. The dip in visitors was enough to end hotel accommodations altogether, and in 1968 the space became an apartment unit that was renamed President Hotel Apartments. A large Hotel President sign perched on the rooftop was promptly removed — making it that much harder for out-of-towners to book an overnight stay.

For much of its existence, Hotel President was an affordable housing option for locals, up until the 2018 purchase. Two years later, the sale was met with tremendous opposition when Palo Alto City Council members approved plans to convert the decades-old apartment into a boutique hotel so as to avoid a potential lawsuit. Tenants were later evicted.
 
Weprin told SFGATE that Adventurous Journeys assisted tenants with moving costs. In a June 2020 agenda presented to the city of Palo Alto, Adventurous Journeys said it expected Graduate Palo Alto to eventually generate “$20,100,000 in recurring annual economic impact for the Palo Alto community once the hotel stabilizes in 2024.”

Weprin said he is excited to reopen the nearly 100-year-old hotel and have locals experience it in its newest chapter. He said he hopes that guests who visit the new hotel feel a sense of its rich history blended with a modern touch.
 
“[Hotel President] was the first real-scaled hotel in Palo Alto,” Weprin said. “This is an incredible, iconic building and we’re trying to [share] the history.”