Near the southern end of La Conner’s historically charming First Street, you’ll find the two-story concrete edifice known as the Hotel Planter. As a decorative cornice atop the hotel’s front façade indicates, the building was constructed in 1907 and has served as a local lodging on-and-off ever since. Current owners Shannon and Stan O’Neil are adding even more historically-accurate and nostalgic touches, including a ground floor confectionery and soda fountain.
The Hotel Planter is the second-oldest building in Skagit County currently housing a hotel, after Anacortes’ Majestic Inn (built in the 1890s), and is the only nationally-registered historic Skagit hotel building to still be a hotel.
Hotel Planter Gestation and Renovation
The Hotel Planter got its start 37 years after the settlement of Swinomish became known as La Conner.
The land the hotel was built on, in fact, was once owned by the town’s namesake – Louisa A. Conner. With an architectural design influenced by the Chicago School style, the original 22-room hotel featured electricity and indoor plumbing, but only one bathroom.
Attracting plenty of affluent visitors from Seattle and beyond in its early days, the hotel also allegedly served as a haven for artists and writers. But it struggled during the Great Depression, and by the 1970s, had become little more than a crumbling transient house.
In 1974, it became part of the National Historic Registry along with the rest of La Conner’s historic district.
The building was eventually condemned, but survived thanks to a change in ownership. In 1987, Don and Cynthia Hoskins purchased the property and set about restoring it. They had their work cut out for them: ivy grew through second floor walls, floorboards were full of holes and a rickety banister required extensive work.
“It was dangerous to walk around and it was a filthy mess,” Cynthia Hoskins said in an article from the Love La Conner website. “However, we saw this amazing potential and knew that this lovely old hotel could be beautiful again.”
The building’s national historic designation provided funding help but also included a laundry list of preservation guidelines. But over the course of two years, the Hoskins family painstakingly salvaged a great deal of original interior finishes, reconfiguring the hotel’s second floor to feature a lobby, common area and 12 guest rooms. This time, each room got its own bathroom. The restored hotel opened in 1989, featuring two rooms that had twin bedframes original to the hotel.
Modern Day Amenities, Antique Charms at La Conner Hotel
After decades of ownership, Don and Cynthia Hoskins retired from the hotel business. In their place, Shannon and Stan O’Neil continue adding to Hotel Planter’s historical flair since taking over in 2023.
The centerpiece of their ownership is the new O’Neil’s Confectionery and Soda Fountain, a ground floor candy store and soda parlor that opened in May 2024. Chock full of antique décor and tasty treats, the eatery added delicatessen and pizza components in July.
Stan, who has collected commercial antiques for over 38 years, spent considered effort in outfitting the shop’s interior with vintage furniture, lighting and signage.
“I’m big into all the turn-of-the-century stuff,” he says.
The parlor has three bars that were all crafted before World War I, including an original front bar, back bar and marble soda dispenser (for display only) from an 1880s-era café in Helena, Arkansas. Dozens of pre-war glass candy jars decorate the shop, as do candy and milkshake-making machines from that time period.
The walls are covered in old soda, candy and snack advertising signs, and several antique tin chocolate molds (including a giant Santa Claus) are also on display; the latter are a fraction of the roughly 2,000 molds the O’Neils have in their collection. And yes – they still use some of them to craft fun chocolates you can purchase and eat, along with homemade fudge and turtles.
In another corner of the shop, a player piano can be heard by inserting a quarter. “It’s kind of a museum,” Stan says. “It’s just a unique experience.”
Other hotel upgrades include adding historic bedframes to each room, all of which will eventually be individually-named to distinguish their historical features.
“We have a bed, all hand-carved, from the 1880s,” Stan says. “We have Eastlake beds, some of them have 9-foot headboards on them.”
In the future, the O’Neils would like to add a ground floor speakeasy and gentleman’s shop – Stan already owns a nearby cigar shop that carries men’s hats, vests, belts and pocket knives.
The hotel also features a courtyard to relax in. It’s a component Stan says many people don’t realize exists, given that it’s hidden between the hotel and another building and can’t be seen from the street.
“We’re constantly working on making it a real nice family establishment,” Stan says. “Nowadays, everybody’s on their phones. We’re trying to do something to take you back in time.”
Learn more and make reservations at the Hotel Planter website.
