The Urbana-Lincoln Hotel – Lincoln Square Mall is a historic building complex located at 300 South Broadway Avenue in
Urbana __NOTOC__
Urbana can refer to:
Places Italy
*Urbana, Italy
United States
*Urbana, Illinois
**Urbana (conference), a Christian conference formerly held in Urbana, Illinois
*Urbana, Indiana
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,
Illinois
Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolita ...
. The
Tudor Revival
Tudor Revival architecture (also known as mock Tudor in the UK) first manifested itself in domestic architecture in the United Kingdom in the latter half of the 19th century. Based on revival of aspects that were perceived as Tudor architecture ...
style hotel was built in 1923. In 1964, the mall was built as an extension of the hotel; it was one of the first fully enclosed shopping malls in Illinois. The hotel, the mall, and the building complex was listed on the
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...
in 2006.
As of October 2017, the mall was still in operation, however the hotel was closed.
Hotel history
![Urbana Landmark Hotel Mall Entrance](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/10/Urbana_Landmark_Hotel_Mall_Entrance.jpg)
A local booster organization called the Urbana Hotel Company began raising money for a hotel in Urbana in 1921. The group raised $223,000 by selling shares in the hotel, and construction on the Urbana-Lincoln Hotel began in 1923. The hotel opened to guests by November of that year and was formally dedicated on January 31, 1924. Local architect
Joseph Royer designed the hotel in the
Tudor Revival
Tudor Revival architecture (also known as mock Tudor in the UK) first manifested itself in domestic architecture in the United Kingdom in the latter half of the 19th century. Based on revival of aspects that were perceived as Tudor architecture ...
style; the building features extensive
half-timbering
Timber framing (german: Holzfachwerk) and "post-and-beam" construction are traditional methods of building with heavy timbers, creating structures using squared-off and carefully fitted and joined timbers with joints secured by large wooden ...
on its
stucco
Stucco or render is a construction material made of aggregates, a binder, and water. Stucco is applied wet and hardens to a very dense solid. It is used as a decorative coating for walls and ceilings, exterior walls, and as a sculptural and a ...
exterior. The hotel was not profitable, and the Urbana Hotel Company went bankrupt in 1937; the hotel stayed open after the company was reorganized. A new management company, the Urbana-Lincoln Company, took over the hotel in 1944 and extensively modernized it in the following decade. The hotel was incorporated into the mall's plans from the outset and was sold to mall owners
Carson Pirie Scott
Carson Pirie Scott & Co. (also known as Carson's) is an American department store that was founded in 1854, which grew to over 50 locations, primarily in the Midwestern United States. Sold to the holding company of Bon-Ton in 2006, but still ope ...
shortly after the mall opened. After failing to turn a profit, the hotel closed in 1975 and was slated to be demolished. In the 1970s, the Jumer Hotel chain purchased the hotel. The new owners renovated and reopened the hotel later in the decade, and an addition was built on the building in 1982. The Jumer Hotel chain sold the hotel in 2001. From 2001 the hotel was bought and sold multiple times. In 2010, developer Xiao Jin "XJ" Yuan bought the hotel for $600,000, renaming it the Urbana Landmark Hotel. Yuan made renovations to the hotel, including fixing the roof, upgrading the HVAC and plumbing systems,
and modernizing some rooms. Yuan's plans were to open the hotel in phases beginning in 2012. In July 2015, Yuan put the hotel up for sale for $5.4M, and the hotel closed in April 2016.
After three failed attempts to sell the hotel,
Icon Hospitality LLC purchased the hotel in January 2020 for $1M, with plans to invest $15M into renovations and re-open the hotel as the
Hilton Tapestry
Tapestry is a form of textile art, traditionally woven by hand on a loom. Tapestry is weft-faced weaving, in which all the warp threads are hidden in the completed work, unlike most woven textiles, where both the warp and the weft threads may ...
Urbana Landmark Hotel. The renovated hotel is set to open in late 2022.
Mall history
![Urbana Landmark Hotel Exterior](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/85/Urbana_Landmark_Hotel_Exterior.jpg)
Due to a general sentiment that Urbana's economy was stagnating, local business leaders reached out to several large retailers in the late 1950s in an attempt to attract a store to the city. Carson Pirie Scott expressed interest in the city if it were willing to build a large commercial development, sparking the Lincoln Square Mall project. The city began plans for a mall in 1960 and hired nationally recognized developer
Victor Gruen
Victor David Gruen, born Viktor David Grünbaum
retrieved 25 February 2012 (July 18, 1903 – February 1 ...
to plan the mall. The Urbana Central Development Company, a subsidiary of Carson Pirie Scott, acquired the land for the mall in 1961, and the name Lincoln Square was chosen the following year. The mall was built and opened in 1964; when it opened, it became the first fully enclosed shopping mall in Illinois outside of the
Chicago metropolitan area
The Chicago metropolitan area, also colloquially referred to as Chicagoland, is a metropolitan area in the Midwestern United States. Encompassing 10,286 sq mi (28,120 km2), the metropolitan area includes the city of Chicago, its suburbs and hi ...
. Illinois Governor
Otto Kerner, Jr.
Otto Kerner Jr. (August 15, 1908 – May 9, 1976) was an American jurist and politician who served as the 33rd governor of Illinois from 1961 to 1968 and a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circui ...
and both of the state's U.S. Senators attended the mall's grand opening on September 17. The mall's stores mainly sold clothing and other fashionable goods in order to draw shoppers from surrounding areas; the developers intended for the mall to serve residents in a radius around Urbana. The mall was successful during its first two decades, and most of its original businesses either stayed or were replaced by similar businesses. Starting in the mid-1980s, however, competition from surrounding malls led to the beginning of the mall's decline. Carson Pirie Scott sold the mall in 1988; its anchor store was converted to a
Bergner's
P.A. Bergner & Co. (also known as Bergner's) was an upscale Midwestern department store established in 1889. The chain is now an online retailer operated by BrandX.com, Inc. The flagship store was located in Peoria, Illinois at The Shoppes at Gr ...
and later a
Herberger's
G. R. Herberger Inc. is a department store chain founded in 1927 with locations throughout the Midwestern United States. The chain was sold in the late 1990s amid growing consolidation in the department store industry, while continuing to operate ...
. Herberger's and the mall's ownership group renovated the mall in 1994, but Herberger's went bankrupt three years later, and its store closed in 2002; the mall failed to attract another anchor and subdivided the store's space into smaller stores. The mall remains open and continues to house many smaller stores and law offices.
References
External links
Urbana Landmark Hotel*
Lincoln Square Mall
{{National Register of Historic Places
Hotel buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Illinois
Tudor Revival architecture in Illinois
Hotel buildings completed in 1923
National Register of Historic Places in Champaign County, Illinois
Buildings and structures in Urbana, Illinois
Shopping malls in Illinois