Hotel construction could begin later this year

Published 1:30 am Saturday, July 18, 2026

PORT ANGELES — If everything goes according to plan, Port Angeles will see the opening of a flagship hotel next summer.

Bamboo Hotel, which CEO Nicholas Curcio started as a business in January 2024, has purchased property at 1016 E. First St. with the intention of building the first of a planned chain of hotels.

“We’re still in discussions with the city and we’re finalizing our design plans,” Curcio said. “We’re still a month or so away from permit submission. So it’s still pretty preliminary, but we’re optimistic this will proceed quickly through the city. Best-case scenario, the build starts late this fall, early winter. We’re hoping for a pretty efficient build process and hoping to open next summer.”

Curcio acknowledged that plan is “insanely optimistic” and said the project could extend into 2028.

The plan for the property is to build a four-story hotel featuring 86 guest rooms across three floors. The fourth floor would have a lobby, bar, fitness studio and a 3,500-square-foot rooftop terrace with a sauna, hot tub, cold plunge and yoga pavilion overlooking the Olympic Mountains to the south and the Strait of Juan de Fuca to the north.

The idea for the hotel chain came to Curcio while he was working in finance in New York, he said.

“I’ve driven all across the country in the last five years of my life,” he said. “I always took every opportunity I could to visit national parks.”

One thing he noticed near the parks was a lack of quality, affordable hotels.

“We ran a bunch of data on 165 markets and looked at the incumbent supply in those markets,” Curcio said. “Port Angeles had really good occupancy, but it could use a real fresh product for a new generation of consumers.”

Curcio and his partners — citizenM Hotels’ former global head of development Menno Hilberts and citizenM former operations executive Andy May — visited Port Angeles and had great interactions with the people here, Curcio said.

“We liked the food scene and the arts scene,” he said. “And, of course, the nature aspect here really makes it a good location for us.”

Curcio partnered with Menno and May last year. CitizenM is a tech-forward hotel brand known for offering affordable luxury hotels.

“I’m not a hotelier by trade, so it took quite a while to get this concept off the ground,” Curcio said. “(Menno and May) really liked this concept and saw the need for it, and they really helped get it off the ground with all their hotel experience in development and operations.”

Bamboo Hotel’s mantra is “affordable, nature-inspired and design-forward hospitality,” he said.

“We want to be accessible with similar rates in the area but offer really high designs,” Curcio said. “Everything about our property is nature inspired. We’ll have natural wood facade, a lot of plantings across the property, and our rooftop pavilion will have all these health amenities like a sauna and a cold plunge. It’ll be pretty differentiated from the hotels that are currently in the area.”

The property on First Street was chosen for a few reasons, he said.

“This was the largest commercial parcel available in Port Angeles, we like that it’s right on Highway 101, it’s a pretty quick drive downtown and to the park, and it offers great views of the mountains to the south and the Strait of Juan de Fuca to the north,” Curcio said.

The rooms will be about 200 square feet, on average, which Curcio said is about one-third the size of a conventional hotel room.

“If you’re in Port Angeles and you’re around Olympic National Park, you probably want to be outside your room,” Curcio said. “You want to be in town or at the park. Our bet is on this more efficient room footprint and giving it back with a well-designed and active lobby.”

Although the rooms will be small, they will feature “creature comforts” such as rainfall showerheads.

The pricing for rooms is planned to be similar to area hotels, putting it at about $170 a night.

The hotel design draws from Nordic and Japanese influences, Curcio said.

“From both cultures, there’s a heavy emphasis on natural components such as plantings, so our rooftop will have trees planted and lots of garden planters,” he said. “In both, there’s a heavy emphasis on wood, so we’ll have a lot of light-toned wood in the rooms and in the lobby. There’s a general size of minimalism and lack of clutter, so there will be very open spaces and high-impact design but not to create clutter.”

Curcio and his partners are working to plan a town hall meeting to host a discussion with the community, but a date has not yet been scheduled.

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Reporter Emily Hanson can be reached by email at emily.hanson@peninsuladailynews.com.