Picture Savannah, and what comes to mind is likely moss-draped trees, cobblestone streets, and, if you’re a fan of “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil,” perhaps a gothic cemetery. But the JW Marriott Savannah Plant Riverside flips the script on what a Savannah hotel looks like.
The hotel is housed in a former power plant along the Savannah River that originally opened in 1912 and served as the city’s main source of power for decades before closing in 2005. When Richard Kessler, CEO and chairman of The Kessler Collection, learned the plant was for sale, he jumped, describing it as “the opportunity of a lifetime.” He envisioned a reimagined riverfront complex, with the hotel as its centerpiece, along with multiple restaurants and entertainment venues.
This massive adaptive reuse project “came together like a giant puzzle,” says Diana Kessler, creative director of the Kessler Design Studio. The team also included Campo Architects; Christian Sottile of Sottile & Sottile architects, who master planned the project; Richard Kessler, Kessler’s president and COO; and PVFS architects. The goal was to repurpose and restore as many features and materials as possible. Around 575,000 bricks were cleaned and reused, and the plant’s generator hall showcases original switches and doors. Old coal chutes are still visible in the walls of the Turbine Cafe.
The Kesslers’ vision became reality when the hotel opened in July 2020, transforming a previously overlooked area of Savannah’s waterfront into a new 4.5-acre neighborhood and entertainment district. At its heart is the former power plant, an imposing building with elegant arched windows. As Sottile notes in a documentary about the project, the building’s original engineers, Charles Stone and Edwin Webster, believed that image was everything. The duo edited a journal on power plant design, writing, “People need to believe in the power of an invisible form of energy, and architecture will help them do that.”
The JW Marriott Savannah spans three distinct buildings — Power Plant, Atlantic, and Three Muses — each inspired by themes of beauty, natural sciences, and water. Beyond the hotel, the project extended the riverfront walkway and includes retail stores, concert venues, and 14 food and beverage outlets, including a private dining room inside a smokestack.
Sottile describes the vast generator hall of the power plant as an “industrial cathedral,” and the cavernous space was converted into a mini natural history museum, where Kessler showcases his personal collection of rare minerals, geodes, and fossils, including one of the world’s largest citrines. Floating above the hall is 140-foot-long Ms. Chromina Joule, the only full-sized replica of an Amphicoelias fragillimus dinosaur, created by paleontologists and paleoartists who spent two years hand-carving bones. The team struggled to find anyone capable of chrome coating the massive structure, and eventually found a specialist who works on Gulfstream jets.
Elsewhere in the Power Plant, the Kesslers extended the fossil connection to the concept of origins with the African-themed Baobab bar, which features hand-painted murals, a crocodile suspended above the tiger eye stone bar, and ostriches perched atop tables where guests can gather.
One of the Power Plant’s most striking features is its Axminster emerald green carpet, “inspired by a beautiful puddle of water I saw in the basement of the power plant before we began construction,” says Diana Kessler. It features swirling shades of green and has no repeat. The carpet flows into the other buildings where it shifts to lavender in the Three Muses and blue in the Atlantic. The property is layered with unexpected details, such as crystal chandeliers in the Atlantic Ballroom that are an exact replica of a map of Savannah.
The Atlantic Building is nautically themed and meant to feel regal and powerful. The ground floor houses a recording studio and performance space, along with the Gretsch Museum, displaying a vast collection of guitars. Guest rooms are designed in bold shades of blue, with heavily veined custom tile called Atlantic Calcutta in the bathrooms. The Three Muses is softer and more European-inspired, “reminding us that beauty is everywhere,” says Diana Kessler.
At the JW Marriott Savannah Power Plant, it’s not only beauty that lasts. The project is a powerful reminder that a building that once generated electricity can still radiate energy decades later.
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