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Tony Colangelo W O R K / L I F E | CARRY ON similar scale," she says.) For Rosemead, Moy will only say he spent "millions" on antiques alone. Despite purchasing more than 2,500 items—side tables, dressers, paintings, mirrors and more—Moy insists he's not an expert on antiques, fine art or furni- ture. "I was always very much hands on when it came to designing the outside of our buildings," he says. "But with this project, I became much more involved in terms of interior design. Because it needed that level of detail." There are 14 rooms in the old inn, each different with terraces, balconies, slanted roofs, alcoves and hidden nooks. The inn's narrow hallways twist like a maze. Every room has different wallpaper, colouring, furniture and knicknacks, plus a $23,000 Duxiana mattress. Clawfoot tubs manage to co-exist beside Kohler smart toilets that open automatically with 17 different settings. Another 14 hotel units in "The Grove" building have been given similar stylings. A spa is expected to open this fall. Room rates range from $500 to $900 a night, with the exception of the $2,000 Dynasty signature suite. A tree grows in the restaurant Off the lobby is Janevca restaurant—the name an amal- gam of Moy's three children, Janelle, Evan and Cailee. The centrepiece is a giant tree with branches hitting the ceiling, sprawling over tables and encompassing diners in a lush canopy through which recessed lighting streams. The foliage changes with the seasons, from Japanese maple to cherry blossom to magnolia. Chef Andrea Alridge, a 35-year-old rising star in the industry whom Moy poached from Vancouver, where she'd worked at CinCin Ristorante and Osteria Savio Volpe (she also competed in Top Chef Canada), describes the cuisine as "wood-fired Pacific Northwest cuisine at its finest." Most items are smoked, cooked in coals or hit directly by fire using maple, alder, apple wood and cherry. There are nods to her Filipino-Jamaican background: Hokkaido scallop crudo on fragrant green pyanggang sauce, Filipino barbecue skewers using her grand- mother's recipe and acquerello risotto with grilled beef tongue designed to emulate the arroz caldo she knew from her childhood. ("It's slowly become a fan favourite," she says.) For dessert, the peach melba is crafted to look like an actual peach, complete with choco- late pit—a creation of Savoy chef Auguste Escof- fier, served here on plates from that very hotel. Trading minimalism for magic The veteran developer admits he's in love with what he's created at Rosemead. He's like a man who walked into a British estate sale and never quite walked back out. But he admits the result has been a flip in style for himself and for Aragon. "In Vancouver, almost every designer is minimalist, West Coast modern," he says. "Whereas the British have a design concept called maximalist. Some people call it clutter. But they always have many layers of colour, and many different things. They call it trinkets... that's what makes it interesting." Interesting is not a word that quite does Rosemead justice. Audacious, perhaps. Unique, definitely. Rosemead isn't just a hotel, it's a love letter to an aesthetic Moy never knew he had, written in 19th-cen- tury wallpaper, vintage books and the flicker of firelight. You don't build a place like this to flip it. You build it because, somewhere along the way, on a journey that borders on obsession, it starts to feel like home. THE GIL DED STAY Left: The Canterbury Room is the eighth room of the 14-room estate, boasting a Tudor and Daub sensi- bility. right: Room 7 is The Windsor Room, with a serene clawfoot bathtub soaking in tons of natural light. ROOT SERVICE Janevca's centrepiece tree is named "Four Seasons" after its changing foliage: from fall leaves to spring blossoms. 80 | BC B U S I N E SS NOVEM B ER/ D ECEM B ER 2025

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