Nobu Hotel Chicago

A Global Restaurant Brand Becomes a West Loop Hotel

Long before it opened a hotel, Nobu was already one of the most recognized restaurant names in the world, built on Nobu Matsuhisa's Japanese-Peruvian cooking and backed by Robert De Niro among its owners. The Chicago hotel, eleven stories and 115 rooms, translates that reputation into a place to stay rather than just eat, with Studio K's interiors pairing a Japanese aesthetic with the industrial textures that define the surrounding West Loop. It took years longer to open than planned, delayed repeatedly before finally welcoming guests, which only raised the bar for what the finished product needed to deliver once the doors actually opened.

Why It Works

What earns this hotel its place is that it leads with the restaurant rather than treating it as an amenity. Nobu's own dining room anchors the ground floor, carrying the Japanese-Peruvian menu that built the brand's global reputation, while the Rooftop at Nobu opened before the rest of the hotel did, a sign of which space the brand considered its real opening statement. A 9.1 rating across 203 reviews suggests the hotel side has caught up to the restaurant's reputation rather than coasting on the name alone, which is not a given for a brand extension this closely tied to a single chef.

Why This Location

The West Loop has spent the last decade becoming Chicago's most talked-about restaurant neighborhood, and this hotel sits inside that reputation rather than adjacent to it, on Peoria Street a short walk from Randolph Street's restaurant row and the Fulton Market district's former meatpacking warehouses turned offices and dining rooms. It trades Magnificent Mile shopping for a denser, more food-driven stretch of the city, useful for travelers who plan a trip around where they will eat rather than where they will shop, and who would rather walk to dinner than take a cab downtown.

Fast Facts

• Price: Luxury

• Vibe: Japanese-industrial, West Loop cool, restaurant-forward

• Rooms: 115 across 11 floors, from 360-square-foot Deluxe rooms to a 1,950-square-foot two-bedroom Villa

• Best For: Food-focused travelers, design-minded couples, guests planning around a Nobu reservation

• Our Favorite Thing About the Hotel: The Rooftop at Nobu, the first part of the hotel to open and still its best seat

• Dining: Nobu's own restaurant for Japanese-Peruvian cuisine, the Rooftop at Nobu for drinks above the West Loop

• Amenities: Soaking tubs and steam showers in upgraded rooms, in-room yoga mats, room service

• Attractions: Randolph Street's restaurant row, the Fulton Market district, West Loop's gallery and design studios

Nobu's Own Restaurant and a Rooftop Bar

Nobu's Chicago restaurant sits on the ground floor and carries the same Japanese-Peruvian menu, built around the brand's signature raw and cooked dishes, that made the original Nobu Matsuhisa restaurant a global name decades before this hotel existed. Guests do not have to leave the building to get the reservation most visitors fly in for. The Rooftop at Nobu, which opened ahead of the hotel's guest rooms, trades the ground floor's formality for a more relaxed scene above the West Loop's low industrial skyline, the kind of space that draws neighborhood regulars as much as hotel guests on any given night of the week.

Rooms From Deluxe to a Two-Bedroom Villa

The 115 rooms span a wide range for a hotel this size, from 360-square-foot Deluxe rooms built for an efficient stay to a 1,950-square-foot two-bedroom Villa with city views suited to longer visits or groups. Upgraded categories add soaking tubs and steam showers, and in-room yoga mats nod to a guest base that treats the hotel as a base for both restaurant-hopping and recovery from it. The range in scale, more than the decor alone, is what lets the hotel serve a one-night food trip and a week-long stay with the same address, without either guest feeling like an afterthought.