Boutique hotel to arrive in Chicago’s Northalsted neighborhood
Chicago’s Northalsted, the city’s LGBTQ+ neighborhood, will welcome a new independent boutique hotel called Backbeat Hotel.
Designed by Miami-biased Studio Rodrigo Buelvas and Chicago-based Jonathan Splitt Architects, the six-story, 41,000-sf property will offer 50 rooms, including 12 suites. The amenities include a rooftop pool, street-level restaurant, below-ground lounge, and gathering spaces.
The hotel’s name nods to Chicago’s strong house music legacy. The lobby and lounge areas combine house-music and disco-inspired details with sophisticated lighting technology.
Backbeat Hotel blends vintage charm with modern design. Along with “design-forward rooms,” the hotel features “decadent textures, mirrored finishes, and a fearless embrace of color,” according to a statement from Studio Rodrigo Buelvas.
“Interiors are wrapped in rich, sun-drenched palettes and electrifying nighttime tones, echoing the rhythms of Chicago’s legendary nightlife and the warmth of a community that thrives on self- expression,” Rodrigo Buelvas, creative director of design, said in the statement.
The publicly accessible restaurant and bar will have both indoor and outdoor space. A speakeasy-style destination bar and lounge will be located underground, behind an unmarked door.
The rooftop pool and bar will provide skyline views, a retractable roof for all-season use, and an entertainment space. The space will be open to the public.
“This destination is an homage to the legacy of Boystown, to freedom, to style without boundaries,” Buelvas said of the hotel.
Backbeat Hotel will be located at the site of Yoshi Café, which closed in 2021. Demolition of the site’s existing two-story structure is scheduled for later this year, with an anticipated opening in 2028.
Project contractor InFocus Builders partnered on Backbeat Hotel with the owner of a Northalsted clothing retailer. The project is budgeted at $25 million to $30 million.
On the building team: Studio Rodrigo Buelvas (design architect), Jonathan Splitt Architects (architect of record), Elevate Consulting Engineers (MEP engineer), M2 Engineering (structural engineer), InFocus Builders (general contractor).
