Macon Magazine

APRIL/MAY 2022 | maconmagazine.com 35 Beeland spoke of the innate challenges in reworking the building. "Walking into the building today, you have no sense of the complexities of the project — making all entrances appropriate, and coordinating and making use of all the levels," Beeland said. "Hotel Forty Five took two years to complete, and is a real asset to the city, another way to bring people downtown and add to Macon's future." 682 CHERRY BECOMES 401 COTTON According to Historic Macon, the exterior of the building remains true to W. Elliott Dunwody's design. "While we gutted stem to stern, when possible, distinctive elements were preserved, like the gorgeous elevator lobby," said Gene Jr. That gorgeous elevator lobby includes the original terrazzo floor banded around the perimeter in ivy green with curving gold and saturated cherry racing stripes leading directly to the original elevator doors. There are echoes of that color palette throughout the building. "We spent a lot of time figuring out how everything would work, down to the entry," said Gene Jr. "There are three entrances, each at a different elevation. The most prominent one was on Cherry Street, which couldn't be opened up for W. Elliott Dunwody's son and grandson, Gene Dunwody and Gene Jr., worked closely with IDP's president Rhett Holmes on the conversion from office and government building into initially planned apartment and retail development. "We were having a hard time making the apartments financially feasible, and the building's small footprint and height provided certain design challenges," Holmes said. Gene Jr. added, "So on a whim, for our presentation my dad drew a floor of hotel rooms." Not IDP's wheelhouse, Holmes was disinclined to tackle a hotel, and the project was shelved. In addition to design challenges, with costs on the rise, Holmes said the financial feasibility of the project was in question. Several months later when the project team reconvened, to the Dunwodys' surprise, Holmes had interviewed an assortment of hoteliers, docking on Tampa-based Mainsail Lodging and Development. "Intent on developing the right product in the market, we knew we needed the right team to make that happen, and we found the right team," Holmes said. That meant starting over, but, Gene Jr. quipped, "On that news, I jumped in the car, drove to Tampa to stay in Mainsail's Epicurean Hotel, and was blown away." Added to the stress of a complete redesign, in March 2020 the indefatigable team weathered another storm and delay when the bank pulled out because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Enter the UDA to the rescue. UDA Executive Director Alex Morrison explained the complexity of the negotiations during this particularly difficult period, which saved the project. "In order to retain all bridge lenders and maintain the time line for tax credits, UDA got a loan commitment from Macon- Bibb County, issued bonds and agreed to be the project's senior lender," he said. When work resumed, Dunwody partner Robbie Beeland assumed responsibility for the construction administration, which Gene Jr. called key to the project. The architects also enlisted the services of their in-house interior designer, Arielle Schlesinger, who Dunwody said deserves a lot of credit for coordinating the architecture and interior design.

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