Chicago hotel firm buys former Joe Ley Antiques site in NuLu

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) – A Chicago firm plans to open a 191-room hotel and restaurant as part of a mixed-use project on the former Joe Ley Antiques property in NuLu after acquiring it this month.

A company connected to Aparium Hotel Group bought the 1-acre site February 3 for $7.1 million, according to online records from the Jefferson County Property Valuation Administrator.

Aparium intends to keep the existing three-story Joe Ley building at 615 E. Market Street, which for years housed one of Louisville’s most famous antiques mart. Ley died last year.

An adjacent two-story structure at 625 E. Market would be razed and replaced with an L-shaped, seven-story building running alongside the Billy Goat Strut alley.

The Joe Ley building would include a bar, meeting space and upper-floor hotel suites, with the remaining hotel rooms in the new building, said Michael Kitchen, Aparium partner and executive vice president. Other plans include a pool and pool house, along with a dining area, terrace and “event lawn” outside.

Kitchen told WDRB News that Aparium has been interested in a hotel at the site since at least 2019. The project would be the company’s first in Louisville.

“As we've looked in the market over the years, we just felt that this burgeoning, high-energy, really well-curated, hyper-local neighborhood that is NuLu was the perfect place for us to be,” he said.

Aparium hopes to break ground on the site later this year and open by late 2024 or early 2025. Updated renderings of its plans are expected to be filed with Metro government next week, Kitchen said.

He said the project’s cost is still being determined, as is whether developers plan to pursue public subsidies such as tax increment financing. “What is available we will explore,” he said.

Aparium’s portfolio includes 10 hotels, including Hu. Hotel in Memphis, Tenn., and three more scheduled to open in 2024.

The initial redevelopment plans for the Joe Ley site were announced in 2019 by Nick Campisano, CEO of Louisville-based Campisano Capital and the Zyyo real estate investment firm of New York. His group bought the property in November 2019 for $2.8 million, records show.

Campisano said in a statement that a series of much-needed renovations occurred since then and prepared the historic building for its “reincarnation.”

“Part of our hotel development plan was always to identify a best-in-class hotel operator and partner that specializes in historic renovations and full-service boutique hotel operations,” he said. “We identified Aparium as an ideal partner for this project and after a year of negotiations and planning, ultimately decided to sell them the property. We remain an investor and limited partner in their project and could not be more excited to see the future of this historic landmark.”

Campisano noted that Zyyo also is developing five properties nearby that “will create a lot of synergies for the neighborhood from a hospitality perspective,” including bourbon tourism, technology offices, short-term accommodations, art galleries, retail and restaurants.

Those include NuLu Crossing at 700 E. Main Street about a block away. That project calls for 284 residential units, according to plans filed with Metro government, or more than twice as many as when it was announced in 2021.

NuLu Crossing also is to have 85,500 square feet of commercial space, including a grocery store. Other features include a three-story parking garage and an outdoor pool and patio.