The upper storeys of the historic hotel?s façade were maintained and restored. Photo by Jeff McNeill
 
PROJECT The Royal Hotel, Picton, Prince Edward County, Ontario
ARCHITECT Giannone Petricone Associates Inc. Architects
PHOTOS doublespace photography, unless otherwise noted
In 1881, the newly opened Royal Hotel was a striking presence in Picton, the centre of Loyalist-settled Prince Edward County near Kingston, Ontario. It included a grand staircase leading to spacious upper-level suites, a handsome dining room, and a popular tavern. The whole was topped by an elaborate octagonal cupola.
Over the next century, the hotel went through ups and downs?becoming the hot spot for balls and birthdays among the area?s gentry when an air training facility was built in 1939, then declining when the county?s canning industry faltered in the 1950s and the military base closed in the mid-1960s. By the turn of the 21st century, it had become a boarding house with an unsavoury bar. In 2008, the building was shuttered, its arched windows boarded up. Former Ontario finance minister Greg Sorbara, whose family runs a real estate development firm, had moved to a farm in Prince Edward County four years earlier. In 2013, after a nearby church was demolished, he decided to purchase The Royal to save it from a similar fate. The restoration process began in 2016, and took off in earnest when architects Giannone Petricone were brought on board and Greg Sorbara?s son-in-law, Sol Korngold, took ...