When Deniece Duscheone was 6 years old, she visited her grandmother on Coronado. Before the bridge to the island town was built, Duscheone and her grandmother would ride the ferry across the bay and enjoy a cup of afternoon tea at the U.S. Grant Hotel, 326 Broadway.
As a little girl sipping tea with her grandmother amid the towering pillars of the historic hotel that has been host to 13 presidents, Duscheone never realized that one day she would be adding to the rich historic tapestry as the lead designer of the 96-year-old building during the $52 million renovation.
The hotel was still under construction when reopened in 2006 after being closed for nearly three years.
Working nonstop for a whole year, Duscheone and her hand-selected team “” comprising technical professionals and students “” dug through the expansive history of the hotel, discovering morsels of forgotten time as they went along, she said.
“You never know what happens when you open up a wall,” Duscheone said.
Each crevice of the 270-room hotel revealed something about the countless moments shared in the now 33,000 square feet of historic ballroom space.
As she dug through old hotel photographs to re-create the historical significance of the lower-level ballrooms, Duscheone found old newspapers and cocktail napkins from parties that happened more than 40 years ago.
Hidden under 19 layers of paint, she found the beautiful white alabaster.
The marble that now covers the lobby floor, public spaces and elevators was modeled off a marble staircase that had been covered for more than 25 years, she said.
“The right thing to do is to put it back to the way it used to be,” she said.
In an effort to re-create the legendary style with a modern twist, Duscheone said she wanted to create a seamless blend of history and luxury for everyone to enjoy.
The U.S. Grant Hotel sends subtle messages steeped in cultural legacy of the city, the land and the memories.
Now owned by the Sycuan Tribal Development Corporation, the U.S. Grant is peppered with subtle images of the primrose, a yellow flower indigenous to San Diego, which, according to www.sycuan.com, the name Sycuan is derived from.
Throughout the hotel, the primrose can be seen amid the minutiae of detail in the hand-painted columns and hand-pounded nickel sinks in the luxurious presidential suites.
The flower is a symbol of the indigenous Kumeyaay Indians, who lived more than 12,000 years ago in what is now San Diego, Duscheone said.
In some respects, time has brought part of the land back to the Sycuan band of the Kumeyaay Nation in the form of ownership of the U.S. Grant Hotel, but for Duscheone the hotel and the history belongs to San Diego.
“To do such an important hotel is completely an honor,” she said, “How lucky am I?”
Duscheone and her company, Sustainability Kinetic Integrated Nature, now adds herself to a long list of designers who have worked on the hotel, starting with Harrison Albright, who designed the U.S. Grant hotel in the early 1900s, according to a historical timeline published by the hotel.
Named for the 18th president of the United States and Civil War hero Ulysses S. Grant, the hotel sits at the former location of San Diego’s first luxury hotel, The Horton House. Alonzo E. Horton built the hotel in the late 1800s after purchasing 960 acres for $265. Those acres would go on to become Downtown San Diego.
Today $265 can’t even book a night in a king suite at the U.S. Grant Hotel, but when patrons enjoy spalike restrooms with bathtubs that change color with temperature and silk bedroom carpets from Thailand, the extra expense is well accounted for, Duscheone said.
“Whether you’re staying in a presidential or not, the idea of the design was to make luxury for everybody,” she said.
The hotel symbolizes Duscheone’s contribution to the city where she grew up.
According to Duscheone, the project was not just another design. It was a way to give back to the place where she shared many fond memories with her mother and grandmother.