Luxury Hotels Atlas / Places / United States / Chicago / JW Marriott Chicago
JW Marriott Chicago
Chicago, Illinois, United States · JW Marriott · Core Luxury
Daniel Burnham's last years produced the 1914 Continental and Commercial National Bank at 151 West Adams, a full-block Loop monument with forty-foot banking halls and a coffered dome. Lucien Lagrange's $396 million conversion opened as the JW Marriott Chicago on 11 November 2010: 610 rooms in the first twelve floors, the Burnham Ballroom still under that dome, and the old vaults turned into a spa.
- 610 rooms
- Opened 2010
- Neighborhood: The Loop
- Rooms from 445 sq ft (41 m²)
- Architect: D.H. Burnham and Company; Lucien Lagrange and Associates
About JW Marriott Chicago
- Daniel Burnham designed the Continental and Commercial National Bank Building at 151 West Adams Street in 1914, one of his final masterpieces and among the largest office buildings in the United States by volume.
- The original banking hall featured forty-foot ceilings, inlaid marble floors, massive bronze teller cages, and intricate plasterwork at the height of Chicago's financial power.
- Chicago designated the building a landmark in 2007, protecting the exterior and surviving historic interior elements before the hotel conversion.
- The JW Marriott Chicago opened November 11, 2010, as the first JW Marriott in the city, preserving the Burnham Ballroom's original domed ceiling in an 8,500-square-foot event space.
- Restoration teams converted the bank's sub-level reinforced vaults into spa facilities while uncovering original plasterwork and mosaic fragments hidden beneath decades of later modifications.
History
The story of the JW Marriott Chicago begins not with a hotel but with a bank, and not just any bank but one of the most architecturally significant financial buildings ever constructed in a city already overflowing with architectural significance. In the final years of his life, Daniel Burnham — the master planner of the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition and the father of the City Beautiful movement — turned his attention to a project that would fill an entire city block in Chicago's Loop financial district. The result, completed in 1914, was the Continental and Commercial National Bank Building at 151 West Adams Street: a neoclassical monument of limestone and steel, twenty-one stories tall, at the time one of the largest office buildings in the United States by sheer volume.
Burnham brought to the project the principles that had guided his most celebrated work — the belief that urban architecture could function as a moral and civic force, that grandeur and beauty were not luxuries but obligations. The building's massive Corinthian pilasters, rhythmic arched windows, and monumental street presence reflected a Roman-inspired vocabulary that Burnham had refined over a career spent reshaping American cities. Structurally, the building represented an early marriage of the classical stone facade with a steel skeleton underneath, allowing Burnham to achieve unprecedented interior volume while preserving the weight and dignity of a neoclassical exterior. The original banking hall was extraordinary: forty-foot ceilings, inlaid marble floors, massive bronze teller cages, and intricate plasterwork that announced the ambitions of a financial institution at the height of its power.
The Continental and Commercial National Bank occupied the building through much of the twentieth century, and the structure was designated a Chicago landmark in 2007, protecting its exterior character and the surviving historic elements of its interior. Three years later, a $396 million restoration led by architectural firm Lucien Lagrange and Associates transformed the building into the JW Marriott Chicago, which opened on November 11, 2010, as the first JW Marriott hotel in the city. The conversion occupied the building's first twelve floors, preserving the most significant historic spaces — including the domed ceiling of what became the Burnham Ballroom, named in honor of the architect — while integrating contemporary hotel infrastructure throughout. Restoration teams uncovered original plasterwork, mosaic fragments, and decorative capitals that had been obscured beneath decades of later modifications; many were painstakingly restored and incorporated into the finished hotel. The sub-level spaces that had once housed the bank's reinforced financial vaults found new life as spa facilities.
The hotel opened with 610 guest rooms, 29 corner suites, a grand ballroom of 8,500 square feet, the 6,000-square-foot Burnham Ballroom with its original domed ceiling, and more than 44,000 square feet of total meeting space. Steps from Willis Tower and within a mile of Millennium Park, it secured AAA Four Diamond status and has retained it continuously. For guests who know their Chicago architectural history, staying within Burnham's final masterpiece — sleeping inside the bones of a building whose designer said "Make no little plans" — carries a resonance that no purpose-built hotel can replicate.
The setting
JW Marriott Chicago occupies the first twelve floors of the 1914 Continental and Commercial National Bank Building at 151 West Adams Street, designed by D.H. Burnham and Company in Classical Revival style — one of the architect's final commissions and the first private building in Chicago to cover an entire city block. The address anchors the Loop's historic financial district, where LaSalle Street's canyon of neoclassical bank facades still evokes early-20th-century commercial grandeur. Willis Tower's Skydeck is a four-minute walk, the Art Institute eleven minutes on foot, and Millennium Park fifteen, offering a base in Chicago's historic commercial core that is equally well positioned for cultural exploration.
Restaurants and bars
- Henrietta — Restaurant
Amenities
- Spa
- Indoor pool
- Sauna
- Hot tub
- Fitness center
Awards
- AAA Four Diamond (2026)
Open JW Marriott Chicago in the atlas for live weekend rates, photos, and the full folio.
More JW Marriott hotels
- JW Marriott Austin — Austin, United States · Core Luxury
- JW Marriott Charlotte — Charlotte, United States · Core Luxury
- JW Marriott Clearwater Beach Resort & Spa — Clearwater, United States · Core Luxury
- JW Marriott Dallas Arts District — Dallas, United States · Core Luxury
- JW Marriott Grand Rapids — Grand Rapids, United States · Core Luxury
- JW Marriott Houston by The Galleria — Houston, United States · Core Luxury
More hotels in Chicago
- Chicago Athletic Association Hotel — Unbound Collection · Core Luxury
- Hotel EMC2, Autograph Collection — Autograph Collection · Core Luxury
- Hotel Zachary, Chicago, a Tribute Portfolio Hotel — Tribute Portfolio · Core Luxury
- InterContinental Chicago Magnificent Mile — InterContinental · Core Luxury
- Kimpton Gray Hotel — Kimpton · Core Luxury
- Loews Chicago Hotel — Loews Hotels · Core Luxury
JW Marriott in The Maison: the brand's idea, history and every house on the atlas.