A Chicago Historic Hotels collection
Characterful, design-forward stays and hostels that keep the history and drop the price — real value in authentic Chicago historic buildings.
Eleven places to stay that cost less without giving up the building. Hostels, a motor inn, a residential hotel and a couple of 1920s survivors — proof that an authentic Chicago address is not only available at the top of the market.
The oldest is the 1886 George F. Kimball Building, now HI Chicago Hostel. The Chicago Parthenon Hostel is in Greektown on Halsted Street, and FOUND Hotel Chicago the 1891 Olympia Building in River North. The Congress Plaza opened in 1893 as the Auditorium Annex, built to house visitors to the World’s Columbian Exposition, and still faces Grant Park.
Two are unlike anything else in the guide. The Ohio House Motel has traded since 1960 and is unmistakably mid-century, its diamond facade motif surviving restoration intact. The Logan Square SRO is a single-room-occupancy building brought back into use — a Preservation Chicago win, and a reminder that affordable housing and historic fabric are not opposing goals.
1896 building
Social hostel near 1914 Wrigley Field
historic Olympia Building
1960 Midcentury motor inn
1893 Auditorium Annex
1924 French-country boutique
1927 Devonshire Hotel
1925 Beaux-Arts building
1924 Diversey Arms