Refurbished Majestic Inn entices travelers to Anacortes

ANACORTES — Most people know Anacortes as the town you go through to get to the San Juan Island ferries, but spend a few hours exploring its parks and hiking trails; home-grown breweries, art galleries and cafes, and you just might want to spend the night.

Enter the newly-reopened Majestic Inn, a downtown landmark reincarnated into a boutique hotel and luxury spa.

Besides sitting at the gateway to the San Juans, it's only a few minutes from Skagit Valley tulip fields, now in full bloom. After touring the tulips, you can soak in a seaweed bath or treat yourself to a sour-cherry body wrap; dine on local oysters and wild salmon; or join the locals fireside in the bar for chocolate martinis and a Peter, Paul & Mary sing-along.

For those who associate this city with oil refineries, fishing and shipbuilding, it all feels very un-Anacortes, which is exactly what the Majestic's trio of new owners have in mind.

A storied building

Reopened last September on Commercial Avenue in the heart of the Anacortes historic district — an area marked by a distinctive new street-spanning "welcome" arch — the Majestic sat vacant for four years following a fire in 2001.

A hotel since 1983, it began life in 1890, first as an office building built by the McNaught Land Co. Later, it housed Anacortes Mercantile Co., touted as the largest store in Skagit County.

When the city lost out on its dream of becoming a major railroad terminus, the business district shifted from the west end of the city to Commercial Avenue. The McNaught building was dragged atop logs pulled by horses to its present location in 1904.

Condemned and slated to be torn down, it was saved in 1983 and operated as a hotel until January of 2001. The fire broke out (blamed on a cat that knocked over a space heater in the third-floor library) the night before it was due to be sold to new owners.

Although that sale never went though, it was purchased by a group of local investors in 2003 who did the bulk of the renovation work, then sold it last April to the current owners, Guy Davidson, an Anacortes real estate investor; and his partners, Bob Morand, also of Anacortes; and Mike Keenan, owner of the Chrysalis Inn and Spa in Bellingham.

"It was waiting for someone to finish it," said Davidson. "Anacortes is changing from a blue-collar town to a town that's reliant on new industries such as tourism, retirement living, health care, boating. There's a different expectation from the people who are visiting here. They want nicer shops. They want nicer restaurants."

Anacortes is a growing community of about 16,000 on Fidalgo Island. Separated by a bridge from mainland Skagit County farmland, it's become popular as a retirement and boating center, attracting people from Seattle and California and other states.

The $4 million redo of the Majestic, said Davidson, who moved to Anacortes from Chicago two years ago, reflects "our vision of what we want Anacortes to become."

Old meets new

Antique chandeliers, high ceilings, and additions such as a marble bar from a 19th-century Montana pharmacy and 200-year-old wooden doors from a London pub create an elegant country-house atmosphere.

With the exception of white shutters on the windows and old-fashioned radiators that were sandblasted and repainted, the décor in the 21 guest rooms is Northwest contemporary, with wicker and wooden furniture, LCD TV sets, and in some rooms, walk-in showers and soaking tubs.

On the ground floor, there's an English-style lounge with a fireplace and leather chairs with live music on weekends, and an airy white-tablecloth restaurant with floor-to-ceiling windows looking out on a garden and gazebo.

A hair salon and luxury spa take up the second floor. Guests can sign up for a massage or hydrotherapy treatment, then sip mint tea and lounge around in robes in front of a gas fireplace in a room called the "Sanctuary."

Bedrooms on the third, fourth and fifth floors, some with private decks, surround a center atrium topped with a stained-glass skylight. A rooftop belvedere offers a four-way view of the town, Guemes Channel and Padilla Bay.

"Respected and loved"

The Majestic's neighbors are a mix of new and old businesses, many of which hope to benefit from its reopening.

There's an art gallery and French bakery across the street; several pubs, including the popular Brown Lantern Ale House; the Anacortes Brewery; antique shops; a marine supply store; and at the end of the street, the Dakota Creek shipyard.

"The people of Anacortes love their historic buildings," said Lynda Bransford, owner of Reflections Antique Mall. The town is also looking forward to the opening of the former Wilson Hotel, another old downtown building being renovated for apartments and retail shops.

"The Majestic is respected and loved," said Bransford, as is the Nantucket Inn, a Commercial Avenue guesthouse in a 1925 residence.

The hotel has found a niche among business travelers during the week. It was fully booked on a Thursday night a few weeks ago, but just three-quarters full on Friday.

"On the weekends, we're starting to get more tourists," Davidson said. "It's typically the people who are headed somewhere else ... but we're working to attract the kind of guest who wants to come up and spend a weekend here."

Relaxing in their robes over coffee in the rooftop sitting room on a recent Saturday morning, two Seattle couples were planning on doing just that.

"In some ways, there's more to do here than in the San Juans," said Paul Thorndike, ticking off the possibilities for biking, hiking and bird-watching that he and his friends had discovered. "And you don't have to wait in the ferry lines."

Carol Pucci: 206-464-3701 or cpucci@seattletimes.com