Work Begins On Canoe Place Inn Project In Hampton Bays

Work officially began on a $110 million project to restore and renovate the former Canoe Place Inn in Hampton Bays on Monday.

The developers behind the project, cousins Gregg and Mitchell Rechler of Rechler Equity Partners, plan to build 37 townhouses on the eastern side of the Shinnecock Canal. Additionally, the restoration of the inn—a former nightclub complex located on the western side of the canal—will include a new 25-room inn, a 1,900-square-foot clubhouse and a 300-seat catering hall.

Both the townhouses, which are expected to be listed at prices starting at $1.5 million, and the old inn will be worked on simultaneously and are slated to be complete by 2020.

The project was ultimately approved by the Southampton Town Board in 2015 after the developer’s first iteration of the project met with fierce opposition from the community. Plans originally called for the demolition of the Canoe Place Inn. It was to be replaced by a 70 private condominiums.

The Rechlers went back to the drawing board after that and later—after meeting with community and town officials—came up with the new idea for the 5.6-acre property that saved the inn.

The president of the Hampton Bays Historical Society, Brenda Sinclair Berntson, who was instrumental in saving the old inn, said this week that she was looking forward to dancing at the grand opening. “Thanks to the Rechler cousins for rebuilding our history,” she said.

The Canoe Place Inn, originally built in the early 1700s, was used primarily as a stagecoach inn and also served as headquarters for British soldiers during the Revolutionary War. After it burned to the ground in 1921, nationally renowned architect William Lawrence Bottomley redesigned the inn as a four-story elegant location for galas and events like weddings and proms.

“We are very excited with the progress being made on both the Canoe Place Inn and Hampton Boathouses,” Gregg Rechler said in a prepared statement on Tuesday. “While changes to these sites will be exhilarating to witness, we’d like everyone to be mindful that renovating the Canoe Place Inn to its original significance is going to be a delicate process. Our commitment to transforming these properties into special places for the Hampton Bays community is unwavering.”