PRESS RELEASE – 21c Museum Hotel Bentonville was named to Travel + Leisure magazine’s 2013 It List of Best New Hotels. Selected by Travel + Leisure editors, the 2013 It List features 61 groundbreaking hotel openings that are transforming their destinations. 21c Bentonville is included in the Design category. The 2013 It List will be featured on TravelandLeisure.com and in the June issue of Travel + Leisure magazine.
Located just north of Bentonville’s historic square and a quarter mile from the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, the 104-room hotel (200 NE A Street) features 12,000 square feet of exhibition space solely dedicated to exhibiting the art of the 21st century. The Museum is open to the public free of charge, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and offers rotating curated exhibitions, site-specific multi-media installations, and other cultural programming such as poetry readings, film screenings, artist lectures, and live performances. 21c selected New York-based architecture firm Deborah Berke Partners to design the 100,000 square foot property. Berke’s design balances grand public spaces scaled to suit an extensive contemporary art collection with intimate, inviting private spaces. The property’s public and gallery spaces are elegant and modern with high ceilings, cool tones and polished concrete floors, while guest rooms, also designed by Berke, offer a distinctly residential feel with its custom designed furniture in subtle neutral tones. The integration of natural light is a central focus; the design team achieved this through the use of skylights, light monitors, large windows and an interior courtyard visible from the restaurant and the main corridor near the guest elevators. 21c Bentonville is also home to The Hive restaurant led by executive chef and Arkansas native Matthew McClure, whose menu highlights the ingredients and culinary landscape of the state.
About 21c Museum Hotels
21c Museum Hotels was founded by Laura Lee Brown and Steve Wilson, contemporary art collectors and preservationists who are committed to bringing works of art to the public through innovative exhibitions and programs that integrate contemporary art into daily life. These goals, coupled with their desire to participate in the revitalization of downtown Louisville led them to open the first property in 2006. The couple selected architect Deborah Berke to convert five 19th century tobacco and bourbon warehouses into a 90-room boutique hotel, contemporary art museum, award-winning restaurant Proof on Main, and cultural civic center in the heart of downtown Louisville. With the success of the Louisville property came opportunities for growth. 21c has opened hotels in Cincinnati, OH and Bentonville, AR and plans have been announced for properties in Lexington, KY and Durham, NC. Each 21c is unique in its site-specific art installations, architecture, design and restaurant. With a commitment to bringing works of art to the public that ignite the mind and fuel creativity, the museum exhibition space is integrated seamlessly throughout each property. There are opportunities to discover art around every corner of 21c: in the restaurant and bar, on the in-room Video Art Channel, in elevator lobbies, hallways, and even the public restrooms. 21c Museum presents a range of arts programming curated by Chief Curator and Director of Art Programming Alice Gray Stites, including thought-provoking solo and group exhibitions that reflect the global nature of art today, site-specific, commissioned installations as well as a variety of cultural programming. The museum is open free of charge to the public 24 hours a day and 7 days a week. 21c museum has presented more than 75 exhibitions including Hybridity: The New Frontier; OFFSPRING: New Generations; Blue: Matter, Mood and Melancholy; Alter Ego: A Decade of Work by Anthony Goicolea; Ann Hamilton: Bookweights; Consuming Cultures: A Global View; Cuba Now; Simen Johan: Until the Kingdom Comes; Creating Identity: Portraits Today; and All’s Fair in Art and War: Envisioning Conflict.
Media contact:
Stephanie Greene
21c Museum Hotels
502.882.6231
sgreene@21cHotels.com
