With the silhouette of the Arriluce Palace silhouetted against the sky could start more than one classic movie. Its two unequal towers and the medieval air of its façade invite the epic, and the escarpment that crowns in Getxo (Bizkaia), to a good cinematographic outcome.
From imagination to experience there is more than one step, but from spring 2023, residents and visitors to this ancestral town will be able to stop admiring this home, until now a family home, from afar, to go through the doors of what will be the new five-star hotel in the area.
Arriluce Palace, Getxo.
When Luisa Rodríguez, project director, she refers to the Arriluce Palace she does as if she were a person. She affirms that she is "one of the team", that she "speaks" and that this project is precisely “the one who asked for the same palace”.
She also Biscayan coast: “As there is already one on the entire Cantabrian coast, this one also needed a A classic but updated luxury proposal, balanced, solid”, says Rodríguez. “The Basque Country has made a great effort to position itself at a tourist level and there was room for this project.”
So this blunt 1912 Construction, designed by the Bilbao architect José Luis Oriol, and in which the owners have lived until a few months ago, It will house 50 rooms –among superiors, junior suites and suites–, several exterior rooms with a small private garden in what used to be a pergola, outdoor pool (one of the few buildings of the time that had it), gym, spa and meeting rooms.
Also a croquet lawn: “It is a very British sport and we are in an area with many British architectural reminiscences. In fact, the director of the construction site was Manuel Maria Smith, Irish descendant. In addition, it is becoming very fashionable in recent years. It was a match."
This will be the Arriluce Palace, Getxo.
"IT'S NOT A HOTEL, IT'S A PALACE"
Of interior design of this building which, in addition, it is protected like other buildings of the Biscayan town dating from the same period (from when Getxo became an ideal summer resort for Basque businessmen and the aristocracy of the interior) is being commissioned by the team of International Hospitality Projects.
Their objective is clear: “Incorporate a five-star program into a building of very high equity value protecting many elements, but without forgetting that we are doing something new, and that contemporaneity it also has to exist within the building and the brand.”
Marquetry, stained glass, early 20th century tapestries are recovered and maintained in the new proposal that, in addition, will take advantage of a large part of the original furniture that the house had, which according to those responsible for the interior design project, “The family has maintained with great care and affection, what has been key in the project.
We have a great base to work from.” All of this will be brought into the present through illumination and combination with a contemporary furniture that will modernize the space and that will call the roaring 20's where the palace was built. “In addition, we will introduce metallic elements that remind us of the shipyards and the sculptures that it houses the Guggenheim Museum, because we cannot forget that we are in the estuary of Bilbao”, explains Mar Gallego, one of the designers.
This will be Palacio Arriluce, Getxo.
At its mouth appears the Arriluc Palace, that among other surprises, has a family chapel that will become a cocktail bar –the bar can also be an altar– or a hidden false door in the palace library that, of course, will remain: “Those things cannot be lost. It is a plus that we do not meet every day”, they point out from International Hospitality Projects. Far from disguising the spaces, They try to make more sense of them.
Local architects have also helped Anton Agirregoitia and Iñaki Peña –“We needed someone who understood the architecture of the area”, points out the director–, who has also been joined by Eloy Martinez de la Pera, expert in international relations, art and fashion who is also part of the board of trustees of the Cristobal Balenciaga Museum of Getaria.
“He has helped us with branding and with the choice of works of art that the house already had. We have been incorporating people who we thought contributed, even if it was not the usual work team of a hotel project”, explains Rodríguez, “but of course, this is not a hotel: it is a palace”.
Beñat Ormaetxea will be the chef at Palacio Arriluce, Getxo.
HERE, YOU EAT
At the controls of restoration project, that in a square like the Euskalduna could not be absent (there throbs Narru at Hotel Arbaso in San Sebastian, Wave by Martin Berasategui in the Tayko, Abel Corral in the still pending reopening Beltz of the Gran Hotel Domine in Bilbao or the also nearby NKO by Eneko Atxa in the new Radisson in the Biscayan capital), will be Benat Ormaetxea, current restaurant chef Jauregibarria (Amorebieta) that shares its name (jauregia means 'palace' in Basque) and the green surroundings with its future project.
He also cooks: “We could only imagine a Basque chef in the restaurant. Beñat's work is very traditional –you just have to see how he dominates hunting–, very product-oriented, and with touches of innovation, just what we were looking for”.
The balance between classicism and modernity also seems to move to the palace table and Ormaetxea, winner of the Spanish Championship of Young Chefs in 2001, tanned among others in the fires of Lasarte de Berasategui, is postulated as a safe option. “We were looking for someone who would fit into the project and who would share our enthusiasm, that he wanted to grow with us, not that it already came with its laureate Michelin stars. We found in Beñat the perfect interlocutor”.
This will be Palacio Arriluce, Getxo.
For Luisa Rodriguez, gastronomy was another cornerstone of the accommodation, especially in a square like the Basque one. “Customers from the Basque Country know how to eat and he prefers to eat well than to eat fashionable, and money is spent doing it. In that sense he is a great client,” she comments.
Even with several classic restaurant proposals such as Tamarises Izarra or Asador Borda, and several places with casual cuisine that are worth a visit, Getxo is not currently a gastronomic destination in itself, Something for which Rodríguez and her team seem to have made a firm commitment: "Arriluce had to go with an important gastronomic proposal, one that was up to the level of the accommodation and the area." It will be called Delaunay, in homage to Sonia Delaunay, the French painter and designer of Ukrainian origin who had a close relationship with this area of Biscay.
The hotel, which will be affiliated with The Leading Hotels of the World –such as Abadía Retuerta Le Domaine, the Marbella Club, the Gran Hotel Inglés in Madrid or Casa Fuster in Barcelona–, will open those doors that will finally be able to be crossed in just over a year and that are already predicted a good ending to the movie.