DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Portland is a hotel in Portland, Oregon's Lloyd District, in the United States. The hotel opened as the Sheraton-Portland Hotel in 1959, and in 1980 became the Red Lion Inn/Lloyd Center.
The hotel has been credited with playing "a crucial role in the development of Portland's eastside". After an expansion in the early 1980s, for a time it was the largest hotel in all of Oregon.[2]
Description
The hotel is one of the five largest in Portland, with 477 guest rooms as of 2020. The property also has restaurants, a covered parking garage and a conference center.[3] The hotel has fifteen floors and multiple glass elevators.[4] The outdoor pool, among few at Portland hotels, can accommodate approximately 20 to 30 people.[5]
History
The hotel opened as the Sheraton-Portland Hotel on September 28, 1959,[6][7] owned by the Lloyd Corporation and operated by Sheraton Hotels.[8] It was the first new hotel in Portland since the opening of the New Heathman Hotel, in 1928.[9] It was renamed the Sheraton Motor Inn in 1963.[10]
In June 1980, the hotel was purchased from the Lloyd Corp. by the Thunderbird–Red Lion Inns chain,[9] and became the Red Lion Inn/Lloyd Center on August 1 of that year,[11] the latter part of the name referring to the Lloyd Center mall, located across Multnomah Street from the hotel. The nine-story hotel had 276 rooms at that time, but a major expansion – including the addition of a 15-story tower – was planned.[9] When the expanded hotel reopened in 1982, it had 520 rooms and was the largest hotel in all of Oregon.[2]
Sign for the hotel, 2022
In 1989, with 476 rooms, the Red Lion Inn/Lloyd Center was still the second-largest hotel in the state, after the 503-room Portland Marriott Hotel in Downtown Portland.[12] In September 1996, its owner, Red Lion Hotels, Inc., then based in Vancouver, Washington, entered into an agreement to be acquired by then-Phoenix-based Doubletree Corp.[13] The merger closed on November 8, 1996,[14] and the Lloyd Center hotel was renamed the Doubletree Hotel Portland.[15] In October 1998, Doubletree announced plans to expand the hotel with a new 300-room tower to be constructed on the northeast corner of the property, in order to make the hotel a 'headquarters hotel' for the nearby Oregon Convention Center.[16] The addition was never built. In late 2010 and 2011, all Doubletree hotels were rebranded as "DoubleTree by Hilton".[17]
A woman was found dead in one of the hotel's stairwells in late 2014. A Washington man was accused of murder and arrested.[18] The woman's family sued Hilton and the hotel's owners.[19][20]
In 2019, a man filed a $10-million lawsuit against the hotel, claiming that he was racially profiled during his stay in 2018.[21][22][23] The hotel issued an apology and fired two employees.[24][25][26] The hotel's operator, Hilton Hotels & Resorts, said that the company has "zero tolerance for racism".[27]
Reception
Hotel exterior in 2022The hotel's interior, 2022
Lizzy Acker included the property in The Oregonian's 2016 list of Portland's best outdoor hotel pools.[28] In 2017, the newspaper's Grant Butler included the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel in a list of "38 landmark Portland hotels that offer a window into Rose City's history, growth". He wrote:
The recently renovated DoubleTree Hotel in the Lloyd District may seem like just another link in the Hilton's chain of hotels catering to corporate travelers. But it played a crucial role in the development of Portland's eastside when it first opened in 1959 as the Sheraton-Portland. The nine-story hotel featured 300 rooms, and cost $6 million to complete. Because of its location directly across Northeast Multnomah from Lloyd Center, the hotel catered to shoppers drawn to the then-outdoor shopping mall, which was one of the first of its kind in the nation.[1]
Fodor's has said, "This bustling, business hotel maintains a steady customer base in meetings and special events, so you will find all the usual business-friendly perks and luxuries.... The large rooms, many with balconies, are well maintained, and many of those on the upper floors have views of the city and—on clear days—the mountains."[29][30] Deanna deBara of Fodor's has rated the hotel four out of five stars.[31] One guide by Moon Publications said "The best thing about this Lloyd District hotel is its location (and the warm chocolate chip cookies at check-in).... The rooms are, for the most part, spacious, clean, and comfortable."[32]
^"Red Lion Dining has arrived at Lloyd Center" (advertisement), in The Oregon Journal, September 12, 1980, p . 24. Quote: "On August 1st, one of Portland's longtime favorite hotels became the Red Lion Inn/Lloyd Center (formerly the Sheraton)."
^Mayes, Steve (August 11, 1989). "Red Lion considers 300 additional rooms". The Oregonian. p. C1.
^"Last of Red Lion Inns' holdings to be sold to Ohio lodging company". The Columbian. Vancouver, Washington. January 1, 1998. p. D1.
^Miller, Brian; Goldfield, Robert (October 25, 1998). "Lloyd Doubletree to grow by 300 rooms". bizjournals.com. Portland Business Journal. Retrieved December 11, 2023.