Hotel del Coronado shut down 367 guestrooms over a year ago. They’re about to reopen — with a few surprises.

By Lori Weisberg

Seven years into the half-billion-dollar renovation of the Hotel del Coronado, the oceanfront resort is about to unveil the final and perhaps most challenging chapter yet — the restoration of its 137-year-old Victorian building, a project so ambitious it required shutting down every one of the 367 guestrooms for over a year.

While a portion of the red-roofed icon already had been refurbished a few years earlier as part of the multi-phased project — most notably the lobby and front porch entrance — the guestrooms, outdoor courtyard and wood-paneled meeting venues had remained untouched, until now.

Guided by a San Diego architectural firm specializing in historic restoration — with the help of the hotel’s original blueprints and an in-house historian — the project sought to physically recapture the look of the 1880s building and its original charm without sacrificing modern hotel amenities such as big-screen TVs, contemporary furnishings and updated showers. (Just seven bathtubs remain in the entire building.)