Wilton Hotel

Wilton Hotel Soundex Code H340

Built in 1926, the eight-story Viceroy Hotel was located at the southeast corner of Kenmore Avenue and Lawrence Avenue and featured a Venetian Gothic architectural style. It was designed by architects Ralph D. Huszagh and Boyd Hill, whose other projects included the nearby Lawrence Hotel and Aragon Ballroom. The hotel contained 144 rooms and featured an indoor swimming pool and several first-floor stores. During the late 1920s, the Viceroy Palais, a dine-and-dance club, operated on the hotel's mezzanine floor. It featured a mix of American and Chinese cuisine and jazz music by Phil Levinson's Viceroy Palais Syncopators. Room rates in 1928 started at $12.50 per week. By the 1960s, the hotel had been renamed the Wilton Hotel. In 1969, the hotel's owners, citing declining business, announced plans to convert the building into a sheltered-care facility for senior citizens. Despite initial community and aldermanic opposition, the project eventually received the necessary zoning board approvals and became a retirement home, later known as the Crown Plaza.