Checking In Again : Time Has Weathered This 1928 Hotel, but Dilesh Patel, 25, Hopes to Turn Back the Clock

La Casa Del Camino sits at the edge of the ocean, a faded beauty on the brink of revival.

Even now--with its interior framing exposed and antique furnishings bathed in dust--the place reeks of romance.

The hotel’s glory days had come and gone before Dilesh Patel, 25, was even born. But since moving from London to Laguna Niguel a year ago, Patel has made it his goal to unearth the charm of this Mediterranean-style edifice, built in 1928 by artist and former City Councilman William Riddle.

Equipped with the building’s original plans, Patel has launched a search for the “historically true” features of the building on the northwest corner of South Coast Highway and Cress Street.

He chipped past pink, white and yellow paint to find the hotel’s original cream color and banished its most recent name, Hotel Firenze, to make way for the original moniker. He will give up French doors leading to fake balconies and change an antique store back into a hotel restaurant.

By late June, Patel predicts, La Casa Del Camino will look almost like it did when movie stars mingled in the lobby and rooms went for two bucks a night.

“It’s going to be as close as possible to what was historically true,” he said.

In a city where all development invites scrutiny, the renovation of one of the city’s oldest historic buildings has generated keen interest.

So far, Patel has been required to trot out his plans for the city’s Arts Commission, Heritage Committee, Planning Commission, Design Review Board and Parking, Traffic and Circulation Committee.

He will be returning to some committees for second hearings, and on June 4 will go before the City Council.

“If there’s a committee, we’ve been through it,” Patel said.

So far, officials are impressed.

“Since I’ve been on the Heritage Committee, I haven’t seen anything like this,” said Ann Larson, a senior planner for the city. “They’re just really into it.

“It’s nice to have a project that everyone seems to support,” she added.

Patel bought the approximately 18,000-square-foot-building in January for $1.6 million, a price that included more than 200 antiques that furnished the hotel. With the renovation estimated to cost another $1.2 million, Patel said it would have been cheaper to “blow it up and start again.”

But Patel knew the hotel’s marketing advantage was tied to its historical significance. He hired Newport Beach architect John C. Loomis, who has expertise in preserving historic buildings, to tackle the project.

“It’s a remarkable example of a historic building pretty much intact,” Loomis said. “This building will look not identical--but darn close--to the way it did when it opened.”

In some ways, the hotel will be modernized. The number of rooms will be reduced from 52 to 41 so that each can have a private bathroom. (Communal bathrooms hold little charm for modern hotel guests, Patel said.) An elevator will be installed to make the hotel accessible to the disabled.

Patel said the hotel’s renovation has caught the fancy of many residents, some of whom remember staying in it in the 1940s.

“The amount of people that are interested in what happens to the building at the moment is really quite phenomenal,” he said. “If I leave the door open during the weekends, then I really can’t get any work done inside, because of the number of people who want to come in and have a look around the place.”

According to the city’s Historic Resources Inventory, La Casa Del Camino was built by Riddle, a painter who served on the City Council from 1928 to 1930. In its early days, the hotel was frequented by actors making movies in the area. Patel has been told that John Paul Getty and Howard Hughes once played backgammon in the lobby.

While city records indicate the rooms rented for $2 to $3.50 per night, the rates will be somewhat higher when the new bed-and-breakfast opens this summer: $100 to $175 per night, depending on the view, Patel said.

The renovation is something of a family project.

Patel, who is of Indian ancestry, was born in Uganda and reared in England. He said he is being backed financially by his father, who still lives in London. Patel lives with his sister, Smita Patel, and brother-in-law, Hitesh Patel, who he said have been a “tremendous help” with the project.

Indian immigrants with the surname Patel own more than a third of the motels in the United States.

Patel said he restored some old homes in London, but nothing of the magnitude of this current project.

“This has turned out to be a real interesting project,” he said, “a learning process. Seeing the development of the building from what it used to be . . . what it [was] when I bought it, and what it’s going to be.”