Lodge Kohler designed for more than travelers
ASHWAUBENON - Lodge Kohler's best features, including a full-service spa and restaurant with fifth-floor view of Lambeau Field, won't require a room key.
The four-diamond hotel under construction in the Green Bay Packers' Titletown District is designed as a destination for local residents as well as football fans, business travelers and vacationing families. The hotel is scheduled to open in July, before the start of Packers training camp at the latest.
The Titletown District is a 35-acre commercial/recreational/residential development, 10 acres of which will be park and plaza with a winter sledding hill, a full-size football field and playgrounds. Other tenants include Hinterland Brewery, which opens at 11 a.m. Wednesday and Bellin Health Sports Medicine & Orthopedics clinic, which plans a summer opening.
Kohler representatives leading tours of the hotel on Thursday emphasized a desire to connect with the community as well as with travelers.
"We really hope the local community will embrace the restaurant and dine with us on occasion," said Christine Loose, group director of lodging for Kohler.
You do have to stay in the hotel to use one of the 134 guest rooms and 10 suites, which are designed with the latest technology and comfort in mind. For example, Loose said, electrical outlets and USB ports are in easy-to-reach places throughout the rooms.
"No one is going to have to go crawling on their knees for an outlet," Loose said. "We are trying to remove every possible item of discomfort."
Desks can be used for work or as dining tables, and another piece is specially designed for storing luggage.
The bathrooms, of course, will be state-of-Kohler's-art, which means bathrooms and showers as modern as it gets, such as three-head showers that can be programmed separately and used all at once.
"Guests can expect an amazing Kohler showering experience," Loose said.
All rooms have floor-to-ceiling windows, which are especially impressive on corner suites, which offer views of both Lambeau Field and of Hinterland Brewery. The hotel also has six ground-level terrace suites on the Lambeau Field side with private patios that include lounge furniture, fire pits and gas grills.
Other features are:
» Taverne in the Sky restaurant on the fifth floor. It includes a wall of wine bottles outside the elevator, an open kitchen with large rotisserie grill, signature bar and back bar, a view of Lambeau Field and of Hinterland Brewery, and outdoor patio with fireplaces and lounge seating directly across from the stadium.
"Normally, you'd put the restaurant on the first floor, but we couldn't pass up the view. We knew that was the right thing to do," Loose said.
» The ground floor does include Leaps & Bounds Cafe. It has indoor and outdoor seating, which faces Hinterland Brewery's beer garden across Titletown Plaza. The cafe will serve specialty coffees, including nitro coffee, pastries, salads, wraps and a snack board. It will be open for breakfast, lunch and evening appetizers with cocktails.
"Nitro coffee is a cold coffee under pressure," Loose said. "When you tap it, it looks almost like a darker beer with foam. It has a fresh, clean taste."
» The 6,000-square foot Kohler Waters Spa, also is on the ground floor, across from the lobby. It will be the fourth Kohler Waters Spa in the world, joining those in Kohler, Chicago and St. Andrews, Scotland.
"It's really kind of a resort spa in a hotel," said Garrett Mersberger, Kohler Waters Spa director. "We don't look at the spa as a hotel amenity. We look at it as a destination on its own."
The spa includes a Kohler-designed Vichy shower, six treatment rooms, sauna, steam room, hydromassage pool, eight-foot-deep cooling pool, co-ed relaxation room, deep relaxation room and outdoor garden. The Hydromassage Experience Pool includes a sit-down hot tub and walkway with water jets that start at the calves and finish at the shoulders as guests walk its length.
"We very much believe in the healing powers of water," Mersberger said. "We have over 150 years of plumbing experience dealing with water. We decided to make our own state-of-the-art Vichy shower."
A Vichy shower provides a constant showering of warm water while the guest lies in a shallow wet bed, similar to a massage table, but with drainage for the water. The programmable shower allows for technicians’ hands to never leave the guest’s body.
The spa will be open seven days a week, including during Packers games.
Mersberger said spas increasingly draw male as well as female guests.
"In Kohler, we are probably more male-heavy because of the golf," he said. "But it's so much closer to the 50/50 range."
» A 1,000-square-foot fitness center with 16 pieces of equipment to start and a swimming pool that allows for laps as well as family swimming.
"If you read anything about travelers these days, wellness is important," Loose said.
Contact rryman@greenbaypressgazette.com and follow him on Twitter @RichRymanPG, onInstagram at rrymanpgor on Facebook at Richard Ryman-Press-Gazette. Or call him at (920) 431-8342.
