The Monument Hotel

Kingkool shared a roofline with the building next door, so when the owners decided to sell in late 2018, joining the two was an easy call. I couldn't buy it myself in time — it went to a different local buyer, and his contractor and I built the hotel together instead. The permit process turned into a real standoff with the heritage department over one first-floor room with built-in cabinets; every fireproofing solution we offered got rejected for one reason or another. We stopped fighting the constraints and built around them — original wood floors, chimneys and dividers left exposed, set against deliberately modern, sometimes odd, objects. Ten new rooms, two with their own kitchens, sharing Kingkool's reception so we didn't need to duplicate it. Where Kingkool is bold and street, the Monument is softer — a custom triangle pattern running across everything from the website to the room keys. Construction ran straight into COVID: aimed for an April opening, got permission in July, opened at 100% finished with nobody around to stay in it. The Vespa wardrobe — a pink PK50 XL with your coats hanging off it — lives here.