Urbana-Lincoln Hotel

The Urbana-Lincoln Hotel was designed by Joseph W. Royer and built in 1924. The original front entrance now opens into Lincoln Square Mall. The hotel has gone through multiple name and ownership changes throughout the years. It closed in 2016 and remained vacant for a number of years. Currently, the hotel is under redevelopment and has been renamed Hotel Royer. It is projected that the hotel will reopen in late 2024.

Hotel History

In 1921, many Urbana business owners wanted to build a hotel for the city after seeing the success of the Inman Hotel in Champaign. Shares sold for $100 each, and a total of $223,000 in stock was purchased by Urbana citizens. This did not meet the necessary $400,000 to build the new hotel. To continue with the plan, organizers had to take out a $150,000 mortgage on the hotel, which they would spend years paying off.

The Urbana-Lincoln Hotel was built in 1924 and designed by Joseph W. Royer in the Tudor Revival style. The hotel has 104 rooms and stands five stories tall. The site of the building was near the old Kerr Tavern, where Abraham Lincoln often stayed when he served on the Eighth Judicial Circuit. To decide on a name for the new hotel, Urbana citizens were surveyed and the two terms that were the most popular were "Urbana" and "Lincoln," thus the name became the Urbana-Lincoln Hotel.

The Great Depression hit the Urbana-Lincoln Hotel hard, and in 1936, the owners declared bankruptcy and went through a reorganization. In 1954, majority shareholders Gordon Kamerer and Charles M. Webber took full control of the hotel. In 1965, the hotel ownership transferred to the Carson, Pirie, Scott and Co. department store chain, after the Lincoln Square Mall was built in 1963-1964, and the hotel's entrance was attached to it. In 1976, the hotel was closed briefly before being sold to James Jumer for $85,000 in 1977. Jumer owned the hotel for many years, renaming it Jumer's Castle Lodge. Under his ownership, additional rooms and a conference space were added. In July of 2001, Jumer sold the hotel to Marine Bank of Springfield who then sold it to Rajni Bhagat.

X.J. Yuan bought the hotel in 2010 and began renovations the same year. Yuan then put the building up for sale in 2015, and finally closed the hotel in 2016. The building remained vacant for many years, and after several auction attempts, the hotel was sold to Icon Hospitality in 2020. The new developers began turning the hotel into a Hilton Tapestry hotel in 2021, after initial setbacks due to COVID-19. The redevelopment of the newly named Hotel Royer is expected to be completed in late 2024, and it will once again be a community asset for the city of Urbana.

Editorial Board. "We're hoping Hotel Royer will be worth the wait," Smile Politely. March 6th, 2024. Accessed March 7th, 2024. https://www.smilepolitely.com/opinion/were-hoping-hotel-royer-will-be-worth-the-wait/.

Kacich, Tom. "A Hotel For Urbana" from Hot Type: 150 Years of the Best Local Stories from The News-Gazette. Sports Publishing L.L.C., 2002, pg.88-89.

Matkovszki, Ilona. Roberts, Dennis. Urbana: Images of America. U.S.A.: Arcadia Publishing, 2009.

Meadows, Jim. "Urbana-Landmark Hotel Sold At Auction For $1.3 Million," Illinois Public Media. September 14th, 2018. Accessed March 7th, 2024. https://will.illinois.edu/news/story/urbana-landmark-hotel-sold-at-auction-for-1.3-million1.

Weirsema, Jana. "Urbana's Hotel Royer on track for late summer opening," The News Gazette. June 27th, 2024. Accessed July 19th, 2024. https://www.news-gazette.com/business/economy/urbanas-hotel-royer-on-track-for-late-summer-opening/article_e82ef663-c835-557b-8b2e-81da2a308ef8.html.