San Francisco-based Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants this week opened its new Kimpton Journeyman Hotel in Milwaukee’s Historic Third Ward.
The 158-room, nine-floor hotel at the northeast corner of Broadway and Chicago Street, features more than 7,000 square feet of meeting and event space, a first-floor restaurant, cafe and bar, as well as an eighth floor rooftop bar and lounge with sweeping views of downtown and the lake.
The name “Journeyman” is a nod to Milwaukee’s manufacturing heritage, while the restaurant name, Tre Rivali, refers to the three rivals who founded Milwaukee. There are old Milwaukee pictures and other local touches throughout the hotel.
A local artist stenciled the floor in the lobby, which adjoins a “living room” in which guests can visit. On the other side of the lobby is a billiard room. A large portion of the first floor is dining space.
The cafe will serve Tre Rivali coffee and Rishi tea. Former “Top Chef” contestant Heather Terhune will serve as chef of the Tre Rivali restaurant, which has its own separate public entrance. The bar serves craft drinks made with local spirits, including Great Lakes Distillery, Central Standard Distillery, as well as local beers, including Milwaukee Brewing Co.
A variety of meeting and event spaces are on the second floor. The second through eighth floor guest rooms are king deluxe rooms, priced at $219 per night. The ninth floor contains one-bedroom suites prices in the low- to mid-300s and the presidential suite.
The hotel is pet-friendly, with ceramic dog statues and bowls in the entrance to each room. There is a bombay chest in each room painted with engine carts and departure gates specific to Milwaukee.
Milwaukee entrepreneur Bob Kraft, chairman, president and chief executive officer of FirstPathway Partners, who brokered the foreign financing for the Kimpton, said he was pleased with how the project turned out.
“I knew it would be good,” he said. “Everybody put a lot of time and effort into it. We wanted the best and we got it. It’s pretty unique to Milwaukee for sure, and being in the Third Ward with the arts and everything going on here, it’s perfect.”
The project was developed by Milwaukee-based HKS Holdings LLC, designed by Kahler Slater Architects and constructed by CD Smith Construction.
