Metropolitan at the 9- Cleveland, OH

Metropolitan at the 9 has my vote for best hotel in Cleveland. While the Arcade may be more historic and photogenic, the 9 is more stylish and fun. Once home to the offices for the Cleveland Trust bank, this Brutalist beauty shines as a high end hotel.

Designed by modernist architect and Bauhaus furniture designer Marcel Breuer, the tower was completed in 1971. Although initial plans called for a second mirror image tower, this was never constructed. Built in the Brutalist style, with lots of concrete and rounded windows, it is a polarizing design, one you will either love or hate.

Inside, there is plenty of polished granite, marble and Terrazzo, which lends a decidedly retro vibe. Downstairs, the original vaults have been converted into a fabulous cocktail lounge, that has the feel of a speakeasy.

Built to accompany the Cleveland Trust’s adjacent 1908 building, a Beaux-Arts beauty with a stunning rotunda (now a grocery store) the two certainly make an odd couple. Both, however, represent successful reuse projects. After a series of bank mergers and closures, both buildings were vacant from 1996 to 2014, sitting idle for almost two decades.

The complex was purchased by Cuyahoga county in 2005, for use as a new county headquarters; this did not happen, and the property was sold in 2013 to developers for $27 million, amidst a scandal involving bribery and witness tampering.

In 2015, Heinen’s grocery store opened in the bank’s original 1908 building, followed by the conversion of the tower into hotel and apartment space. The Vault, the hotel’s cocktail lounge, located under the Cleveland Trust’s rotunda, utilizes the bank’s old vaults. Stylish and historic, it is the perfect place to hit before heading up to your room.

Rooms here are surprisingly modern, and very comfortable, most with great city views out of the porthole windows. While not everyone will appreciate the original architecture, most will love what they have done to the place.