New $46M AC hotel in Midtown Detroit will include Bonstelle Theatre restoration

Construction could begin this summer on a 10-story, $46 million hotel project along Woodward in Midtown Detroit that will incorporate the old Bonstelle Theatre.

Detroit-based developer Roxbury Group announced Tuesday that it has an agreement with Marriott International to open a 153-room AC Hotel in the planned building, which would go up at Woodward and Eliot Street, next to the Bonstelle Theatre, on a lot that is now a parking lot.

The developer previously planned to put a "West Elm"-branded hotel on the site, but that didn't happen. The AC Hotel project is expected to open in late 2021 and will include restoration of the Bonstelle, which will connect to the hotel with a glass-enclosed conservatory and be converted into conference and event space and a bar.

The Roxbury Group has a long-term lease of the Bonstelle from Wayne State University.

AC Hotel is a mid-, upper-level, European-inspired brand that began in Spain and has been owned by Marriott since 2011. The Detroit hotel would be the second AC Hotel in Michigan; the first opened in Grand Rapids.

A quick web search found rates of about $270 per night at the Grand Rapids hotel.

Detroit is experiencing a mini-boom of new, midsize hotels as nightly occupancy rates continue to rise and more guests desire to stay downtown.

Recently opened hotels include the Shinola Hotel and The Element at the Metropolitan. There are several new hotels under construction, including the Cambria Hotel in downtown and The Temple Hotel near the Masonic Temple.

More: More Detroit hotels are in the pipeline. Here's why

More: High-profile hotels, movie theater coming to Woodward in Midtown

"We are honored to be restoring the beauty of the Bonstelle and seamlessly integrating it with the modern sensibility of AC Hotels," David Di Rita, principal of the Roxbury Group, said in the announcement.

The Bonstelle Theatre opened in 1903 as a synagogue and became a theater in the 1920s. It was purchased by the university in 1951. Wayne State announced in 2018 that, following an expansion of the Hilberry Theatre, it would decommission the Bonstelle.

Contact JC Reindl: 313-222-6631 or jcreindl@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @jcreindl. Read more on business and sign up for our business newsletter.