MOA’s Stanley Hotel Expansion and New Film Center Projects Showcase How Hospitality Design Creates Memorable Spaces
Best known for its work in healthcare and educational spaces, MOA Architecture has long worked in the world of destination design. Their latest and most ambitious hospitality project is the expansion of the iconic Stanley Hotel, the property that famously inspired The Shining, into a multi-use cultural destination featuring a film and event center and the expansion of the iconic hotel. But this renovation and expansion isn’t just about building something new. It’s about honoring the past, thrilling the present, and designing for the future all at once.
“There’s something about stepping into a place with history where walls echo with stories, the light hits just right, and the atmosphere makes you feel something,” says Jack Mousseau, Principal and Project Director. “That emotional charge is at the heart of hospitality design today.”
The journey to the Stanley project began, unexpectedly, with a photograph. According to the company, the former owner of the hotel happened to walk past MOA’s gallery and spotted an image of a performing arts center the firm had designed in Casper, Wyoming. That single snapshot sparked a ten-year collaboration culminating in the current expansion: a new hotel addition, a film center, and immersive experiences that honor the Stanley’s eerie charm while looking to position it at the center of Colorado’s growing tourism economy.
“We’re in the construction document phase now,” says Mousseau. “The work has to integrate with the hotel’s original architecture. We’re not just adding buildings. We’re expanding legacy.”
MOA has a long-standing presence working in Estes Park with projects like the Stanley Carriage House, which is home to the Post Restaurant, the Stanley Caretaker’s Cottage renovation, the Stanley Aspire Spa Renovation, and Aiden Sinclair’s Underground Magic Theater.
Designing around and connecting to a historic structure is no small feat. It means navigating outdated materials, non-compliant stairwells, and accessibility requirements that were often not considered in the early nineteen hundreds. “There are a lot of technical challenges around life safety, ADA compliance, and building code,” Mousseau explains.
But for MOA, those challenges are the point. The firm thrives at the intersection of constraint and creativity. And when the canvas is a reportedly haunted hotel, where real history blends with Hollywood myth, the possibilities are both eerie and eclectic.
While the Stanley’s ghostly reputation might attract horror buffs, MOA’s approach is rooted in something deeper: social relevance. Whether designing a therapeutic school for at-risk youth or a hospitality space for art, music, and memory-making, the firm sees architecture as a vessel for human connection. “In hospitality, amenity spaces are where people really live the experience: where they fall in love, celebrate, and make memories,” Mousseau explains. “Those are the spaces that shape people’s lives, and we get to be a part of creating those spaces.”
This people-first approach has long guided MOA’s legacy in education. “We design schools that aim to nurture students and faculty,” says Mousseau. “With hospitality, we’re doing the same thing, enhancing experiences that may lead to real returns. And not just financially, though the return on investment is part of it. We’re talking about emotional returns on investment.”
In a world where social media has become more influential in travel, MOA insists that people don’t just want a place to stay, but a place to share. “Travelers today are saying, ‘I stayed at this amazing place,’ not because it was convenient, but because it was cool,” MOA President Katie Vander Putten says. “Great design gets people talking. It builds reputation, loyalty, and yes, revenue.”
For MOA, the hospitality space is also a welcome playground: a place to rekindle the joy that first drew them into architecture. “There’s a freedom here,” Vander Putten says. “In healthcare and education, you’re bound by a thousand codes and clinical needs. But with hospitality, we can stretch creatively, take risks, and tell stories. It’s like being back in architecture school; the fun of making magic out of design.”
With an ever-expanding portfolio, MOA sees great potential in growing its footprint in the hospitality space, especially where legacy, community, and creativity intersect. “Our goal isn’t to become a hospitality firm,” Vander Putten says. “It’s to work on the right projects, ones that matter, that let us collaborate with visionary clients, and that allow us to create places people never forget.”
For the firm, the Stanley Hotel and Film Center is more than a project. It’s an attempt to preserve the past, captivate the present, and inspire the future, all in one building. Vander Putten concludes, “When architecture taps into memory, emotion, and experience, it becomes more than walls and windows; it’s a story people never stop telling.”
As seen in USA TODAY: MOA’s Stanley Hotel Expansion and New Film Center Projects Showcase How Hospitality Design Creates Memorable Spaces