Busted water pipe closes historic Gunter Hotel as it undergoes $45 million renovation (2024)

During demolition work inside the downtown Gunter Hotel in early July, a water pipe was accidentally destroyed, triggering sprinklers that caused water damage to half the building.

“We had guests we had to move out, and we had reservations on the books,” said Jiwon Choi, managing director of Axle Capital Group, which has owned the historic hotel since 2012.

Choi, who moved from Los Angeles to San Antonio last year to oversee the company’s ambitious, $45 million renovation of the hotel, said they’d hoped to keep it open during the renovation, working one floor at a time with an empty floor in between to buffer noise from guests.

A water pipe accident ended that plan. Service elevators that were to be used to take materials up and down floors were damaged, Choi said, and the flooding meant water damage restoration had to be added to an already-long to-do list.

The hotel’s closure on July 3 prompted the company that manages the hotel staff, Evolution Hospitality, to alert the Texas Workforce Commission that the hotel could be forced to lay off up to 75 employees by Oct. 1 if additional “unforeseen delays in renovation occur.” Those layoffs would be temporary, the letter said.

For now, all workers remain employed, and are receiving their pay and benefits through Sept. 30, the letter states. Choi said some employees are still actively working at the hotel, and she hopes to bring the rest back “as quickly as we can.”

The renovation, which was first announced last year as a $30 million project, will now likely end up being even more than the recently revised $45 million investment, Choi said.

Updating the Gunter Hotel while honoring its deep history in San Antonio is worth the cost and the surprises, she said.

“I’ve learned so much about San Antonio in this process,” said Choi, who is working with Elizabeth Fauerso of EDF Development & Design Studio to connect the upscale renovation to the hotel’s storied past. “Everyone I meet has a story about the Gunter.”

She said despite the water damage setback, she hopes the renovation will still be complete by the end of this year. Once a Sheraton property, the upgraded hotel will join the Marriott’s Tribute portfolio of boutique hotels.

Choi spoke from what was a part of the Sheraton Club Lounge on the second floor of the hotel, which will become a recording studio that will open up to both a revamped terrace and a lounge area inside, so guests can watch musicians or podcasters do their thing.

Blues legend Robert Johnson recorded at the Gunter in 1936, and Choi said that each room will have its own record player, and they’ve already acquired Johnson’s records. An album lending library will be located in the lobby.

Below the future lounge next to the recording studio is Bar 414, which will also be updated, and an old gift shop next door will become a Topgolf Swing Suite, Choi said. A “secret staircase” will be opened up for events or when the recording studio is being used.

Korean bakery chain Paris Baguette will move into the corner space at East Houston and N. St. Mary’s streets in an area that’s now used as a meeting space, Choi said, and a new restaurant will take the space along Houston that the Market on Houston used to occupy.

Opened in 1909, the eight-story Gunter Hotel began life as the Frontier Inn in 1837, its kerosene lamps welcoming “the influx of pioneering settlers from the East” according to the history on the hotel’s website.

The basem*nt of the hotel remains open for the clientele of the barbershop that has been there since the hotel opened. Historic photographs of the hotel and its guests, including Mae West, Joe “Flash” Gordon of the New York Yankees and Miss San Antonio 1939 Irene Hoffman, line the basem*nt hallway.

Choi said those photos and others will have more prominent places throughout the hotel as part of the renovation.

Barber Lee Bosmans said he’s celebrating his 50th year cutting hair and trimming beards this month. He pointed to a photo of the “17 barbers, five manicurists, two cashiers and five porters” who worked at the barbershop in its heyday of the 1930s and 40s.

He pointed to two men, brothers he said were related to famed military aviator James Doolittle. “They hired me in my 20s,” Bosmans said.

He said he’s thrilled that Choi is renovating the hotel — and is keeping the barbershop as is. “Heck yeah I love it,” he said. “And I think she loves the hotel, I really do.”