Inside Musician Tift Merritt’s Revamped Motor Lodge in Raleigh

In the dining room of singer-songwriter Tift Merritt’s bungalow in Raleigh, Post-it notes adorn the walls. They don’t contain lyrics or song ideas, though, but instead reminders for “Soap Decisions” and “BUILDING A: LAMPS, BED x 13.” Merritt, along with her business partners Daniel Robinson and Sarah Yarborough, is in the final stages of readying an eighteen-room hotel just north of downtown Raleigh called the Gables, slated to open in September. Or rather, reopen: The 1920s motor lodge served as a rest stop for travelers along U.S. Route 1, a once-popular East Coast highway.

Loads of ephemera are strewn about Merritt’s house, such as a box of old eight-track tapes by the likes of Dolly Parton and Buck Owens, salvaged from inside the Gables before Merritt and team brought the building down to the studs. “There was so much stuff,” Merritt says, “it was like the previous owners just locked the door and left.” Elsewhere in her house are fabrics in rich tones like dark teal and tomato red, colors that will appear throughout the hotel and in the Gables’ Parisian café–influenced Alcove bar.

Merritt had never considered dipping her toes into the hospitality business—among other endeavors, she’s a practitioner in residence with the Franklin Humanities Institute at Duke University—but in 2017, her music career had reached a crossroads. She was worn out from touring; the economics had become increasingly challenging, and on her last couple of stints on the road, she had toted her toddler daughter along. The music business is notoriously unkind to women, especially single mothers, and Merritt felt it was time to set down some roots in Raleigh, where she had grown up and where her parents still lived.

Shortly after she returned, a friend texted her the listing for the Gables: $850,000, as is. Intrigued, she reached out to her good pal and legendary Austin, Texas, hotelier Liz Lambert for advice. “She told me, ‘T-Bird, I think you should get off the road and become a madam,’” Merritt says with a laugh. “She gave me confidence, because if a folk singer is involved in a real estate transaction, things are bound to be complicated.” Lambert introduced her to Robinson, who had codeveloped the Durham Hotel, a mid-century gem in its namesake downtown. Merritt brought in her longtime friend Yarborough, the cofounder of the bespoke-jeans outlet Raleigh Denim, for design expertise.

In 2020, the team was ready to move forward, but the day before their construction loan was to close, COVID shut down the entire state. The delay turned out to be fortuitous. They owned the property, and without the pressure of a construction loan to pay off, they had time to quiz other Raleigh friends over group dinners about what they loved—and didn’t love—about past hotel experiences. The trio began to envision the Gables as not just lodging, but a gathering place for Raleigh’s bohemians and misfits, traveling creative types, and neighbors who were initially wary of development.

We leave Merritt’s house and make stops at the Raleigh Denim store to pick up fabric samples and at the local chocolatier Escazú, whose confections will be the mint-on-a-pillow in the Gables rooms. On-site, the hotel is still a construction zone, but as Merritt whirls her way around, the vision comes to life. The property combines an art nouveau vibe with the laid-back feel of Laurel Canyon in the 1970s, with sunny, natural-light-filled guest rooms. The two-story building has hardwood floors, but the team laid down carpet on the second floor to help mitigate foot traffic noise.

The cozy Alcove bar will serve such cocktails as a white port and tonic, a mainstay drink in Portugal, one of Robinson’s favorite countries to visit. The space anchors a newly restored and expanded stone parking garage that also includes five brand-new rooms. When the weather is nice, Merritt imagines throwing open the bar’s doors, which spill out onto a large lawn where she hopes people will come together for picnics, book readings, and acoustic sets. (Ironically, her work with the Gables helped stimulate Merritt’s songwriting output; she just released Sugar, her first album in nearly ten years, with a promise to do a handful of shows in the fall, perhaps even a gig in the bar.)

The Gables has been nearly six years in the making, and the three partners have found a rhythm together. Robinson plays the experienced taskmaster, Yarborough the assured sounding board, and Merritt the creative driving force. Everyone gets a say in even the most minute decisions, from coat hooks to the colors of seat cushions. And as the project enters crunch time, it’s clear this isn’t some corporate development scheme (though Merritt dreams of a Gables outpost in Europe), but rather a labor of love that showcases what Raleigh has to offer. “We’re not scalable,” Merritt says. Yarborough adds quickly, “But we’re more than capable.”