The white church stands on the corner of Griffith Park Boulevard and Lucile Avenue, on the edge of Sunset Junction, its bell tower topped with a cross. It went up in 1931 as Bethany Presbyterian Church, a Romanesque Revival building in white stucco by the architect Scott Quintin. Later it was an early home for East West Players, one of the first Asian American theatre companies in the country, then an antiques market, a film location and the set for Delusion, a horror show. For the best part of the past decade it stood empty.
Getting from there to here took a while. A developer won permits for a hotel in 2014 over the objections of neighbours worried about traffic, then went bankrupt, and in 2020 Casetta, a Santa Barbara group whose name is Italian for little house, took over the long lease from the property's owner, the Presbytery of the Pacific. Hotel Lucile opened on 14 September 2026, joining a portfolio that includes the Surfrider in Malibu and Casa Cody in Palm Springs. The name appears to nod to Lucile, an 1860 poem by Owen Meredith.
The design
Electric Bowery did the architecture and interiors, and kept the church in plain sight. The wooden beams, vaulted ceilings, arches, masonry and stained glass all survive. The rooftop cross is lit at night; only the old bell stays silent. The rooms sit in the old church school, arranged around a sun-drenched courtyard, with their original wood floors, steel-framed windows and vintage furnishings, and bathrooms with stained-glass windows of their own. The Lucile Suite has a private courtyard and fountain.
The church's other parts have found new jobs. The organ loft is a meeting room overlooking the former sanctuary, the choir loft is a wood-lined mezzanine lounge, and the old chancel stage can be turned into a private dining room or used for live music. Above it, a deep red mural by the painter Erin Lynn Welsh honours Eaton Canyon in Altadena, devastated by fire in January 2025; at the other end of the room, a green one draws on the native plants of Elysian Park. Local art rotates through the hotel, much of it for sale, and even the coasters are stained glass.
The organ loft takes meetings now, and the choir loft takes a martini.
Dinner in the nave
The restaurant, Sous Sous, fills the church's high-ceilinged nave, with a marble bar shaped to resemble a church organ. It cooks somewhere between the south of France and the American South, and it has a review of its own. Each evening a martini cart makes its rounds of the hallways, and by day a café looks after guests at breakfast and lunch.
Staying there
Up top, a deck reserved for guests looks out across Silver Lake towards downtown. Below street level, a small pool sits in a sunlit grotto, built for a cocktail rather than lengths. There is no on-site parking, so plan on the valet or the street; Sunset Junction, the reservoir, Griffith Park and Frank Lloyd Wright's Hollyhock House are all close.
