Hotel Hardware to open in summertime

DAYTON-For the past few months, people have been peeking through the cracks in the shuttered windows of the former Weinhard Hotel on Dayton's Main Street, trying to see what's going on inside the newly rebranded Hotel Hardware.

Owner and General Manager Padraic Slattery is the man behind the mystery, and he is eager to launch the hotel website and reservation platform in the coming weeks, inviting people in.

When the hotel opens to the public this summer, guests can expect a four-star boutique hotel experience, he said.

There are fifteen rooms altogether. Most are appointed with rich oak floors except for a couple rooms on the top floor, which retain their original fir flooring. All the rooms feature brass fixtures, curated lights from Schoolhouse Electric, soaring ceilings, and midnight navy blue casework, with a clean minimalist look. Adding to the allure, he said, are custom mattresses, handmade spa-quality bath products, comfortable robes, and in-room televisions, as well as access to the rooftop deck.

There's more.

The hotel will feature a craft cocktail shop. The Cocktail Shop will be open for business seven days a week, operating as a wine bar weekly from Sunday through Tuesday. Wine and cocktails will be offered on Wednesday through Saturday of each week. The Cocktail Shop will deliver a "handmade experience to guests, and the organic wine bottle shop will feature a "curated portfolio of limited intervention wines," he said.

Lane Gwinn

Attention to detail and design is evident throughout the hotel.

A specialty coffee shop serving Indaba coffee from Spokane is also planned, with coffee shop creations inspired by his travels to various Chinatowns throughout North America.

For the added culinary enjoyment of his guests, Slatterly plans to partner with local restaurants, food trucks, and rotating food vendors.

His biggest contribution to society, he said, is rooted in his passion for historic preservation. To that end, he has completed a dozen commercial and residential restoration projects throughout the greater Seattle area. In 2022, he was appointed to the Seattle Landmarks Preservation Board.

Slattery was in the process of purchasing a building in La Conner, but when that deal fell through, he followed up on an ad for the Weinhard Hotel.

"I knew this was the next project from the second I walked into the building," he said.

While the Dayton hotel is not his largest undertaking, Slattery said it is the most interesting, remotely located, and management-intensive venture he has undertaken.

"I have jumped out of my comfort zone into deep, unfamiliar waters," he said. "A lot of people think I'm crazy for doing this. On most days, I agree with those opinions, but this is who I am."

He recognizes the importance of the Weinhard family's historic legacy to Dayton. In 1890, Dayton brewer Jacob Weinhard had a block of commercial buildings constructed on Main Street. Retail shops included a jewelry store, a drug store, a small hardware store, and Weinhard's saloon. A lodge hall and some professional offices were on the second floor above the retail shops. A large hardware store occupied the building where Locally Nourished is now. Longtime commissioner for local historic preservation, Virginia Butler, said the former saloon was the part that burned down when it was a grocery store in the 1960s. It is now the east side parking lot at the hotel. In the early 1990s, Virginia and her husband, Dan, renovated a part of the block and opened the Weinhard Hotel.

In honor of Jacob Weinhard and his uncle, Henry Weinhard, the famous Portland brewer, Slatterly has commissioned portraits of the pair, which will occupy a place of honor above the fireplace in the hotel lobby.

Slattery purchased the hotel in November for $788,000. Funding for the renovation is through a Small Business Administration loan. Cost overruns are his responsibility, he said. Because the hotel is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, it is also a federal historic tax credit project.

It was a "function of fate" that brought Slatterly to Dayton. He pointed out Dayton's many positive attributes, including the golf course, Ski Bluewood, artisan foods, an active theater, and growing art scene.

He hopes to add to the cultural mix by hosting outdoor movies, a casual golf tournament, and an annual Stand by Me festival. The movie has a special place in his heart, he said, pointing to the Daniel Lopez mural on the outside wall, which depicts the boys who starred in Director Rob Reiner's 1986 film. He said the mural has garnered applause from two of the film's stars, Wil Wheaton and Jerry O'Donnell.

"Dayton is a growing scene. It is untapped, scenic, in some ways gritty and seemingly stuck in the past, but its potential is undeniable," he said. "Not to mention, you can pull a steelhead right out of the river that runs through downtown."

Slattery has degrees in accounting and finance from WSU and an MBA from the Seattle campus of Northeastern University. He is a Sonics and a Blazers fan, and he considers Seattle his first home and Portland his second. After many months of driving back and forth from Seattle, he will now call southeastern Washington his third home.