Unique and beautiful is the standard for this boutique hotel

Rockland’s 250 Main Hotel is open for business

Thu, 05/05/2016 - 12:00pm

    ROCKLAND — The new kid on the block in Rockland is 250 Main Hotel.  After a lengthy construction period, the boutique hotel, built by Lyman Morse, has opened with five floors of guest rooms, balconies, a rooftop space and enough artwork from local artists to easily let it qualify as the largest art studio around.

    Michael Roy has served as project manager for construction at 250 Main.

    “It’s very, very nice that it’s open now,” he said. “It was nice to see people having breakfast in here this morning and enjoying the surroundings.”

    The roof top deck has yet to be completed, but work on it is coming along. There is debate though on whether it resembles a ship’s bow or stern.

    “Originally we were going to do the roof deck in the fall,” Roy said. “We decided to tackle it now and they are just wrapping it up. I guess it could be a ship’s bow or stern. Whatever you want it to be. I think it looks more like a stern.”

    On the fourth floor is a unique room known as the garden room. It is both beautiful and inspirational. It features a large outdoor sitting area and shrubs to enhance its coziness.

    The garden room was built to be eco-friendly.

    “The idea behind the room was that when a family stays, they can have this room and a room adjacent to it,” Stone said. “The large balcony and lounge area make it easy to spread out.”

    “That idea actually came through from the architect,” Roy said. “It gave two rooms access to a small balcony area and deck area where you can look out over the ocean from a different perspective than the rooms with just the window views.”

    Stephanie Stone is the head of housekeeping at 250 Main. She said there are 26 rooms spread out over five floors. She said the roof top deck would be limited to guests.

    Roy said they would host some special events on the rooftop.

    250 Main does not have a restaurant on the premises. Both Roy and Stone said that they encourage guests to go out into the town and enjoy the shops, museums and restaurants that Rockland has to offer.

    Unique is the lock system on the doors. Stone said the hotel is security-minded.

    “It’s a simple touch system that uses a magnetic programmed key,” she said. “When a guest checks out the code is changed on the key. All you need to do to open your door is touch the key to the sensor. And it only opens your door, of course.”

    Roy said there is no intention to build another hotel.

    “The process has been long,” he said. “If you describe a normal hotel being built, it’s all pretty standard; but this is a boutique hotel and it’s unique. I’ve had a lot of years in high-end construction and when all the finishes and things are put inside, it feels like a house, not a typical hotel.”

    When you step off the elevator on each floor, you step into a different gallery of art.

    “What’s really cool about it is that it’s not an art studio, it’s a collaboration of all the art studios,” he said. “The interior designer and architect who worked on this project wanted to make this unlike any other hotel. It would be hard to find anything similar to this.”

    250 Main opened May 1.  Being directly across from the Lobster Festival grounds, Maine Boats and Harbor Show and the Blues Festival, there is little doubt they won’t have any trouble finding guests to stay at this unique hotel.