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Does hotel style carry excess baggage? Renovation of former Mark Antony provokes cultural debate in Ashland By WENDY SIPOREN ASHLAND -- Substandard wiring and deteriorating stucco aren't the only potential headaches when you're renovating a major landmark in this opinionated theater town. After newspaper articles appeared announcing the interior design theme for the new Mark Antony -- now called the Ashland Springs Hotel -- some began quietly suggesting that references to British colonial Africa wouldn't play well in Ashland. Others were more outspoken in their criticism, saying they were disturbed by the designers' naive nostalgia toward a barbaric institution like colonialism. "Would anyone decorate a hotel interior with chains, shackles and whips from America's slavery period?" wrote Southern Oregon University sociology professor Echo Fields in a letter to the editor. The hotel's owners and the San Francisco design firm hired to furnish the hotel's interior says their design concept has been greatly misunderstood and has nothing to do with colonialism in general. "The true theme of the hotel is that of an expression of a local naturalist during the time of the Chautauqua dome lecture series. ... The only connection (to colonialism) is that the look of the lobby recalls the style of British colonial interiors around the turn of the century," said the firm's marketing director, Claudia Adetuyi. "It has nothing to do with the culture of the time period," she said. "Nobody gets offended by caned chairs and ceiling fans. These people certainly misunderstood." The articles even caught the attention of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, which uses the ballroom for events and whose patrons likely will stay at the hotel. After a meeting between OSF representatives and the hotel's project manager, references to Africa and the "masculine" features of a room were removed from promotional materials. Festival representatives were asked to help write future press releases and collateral sales materials to avoid future misinterpretations. "You put Africa and colonial in the same sentence and ... you start leaping to all these other perceptions," said artistic director Tim Bond, who also coordinates the festival's diversity council. "It was a little scary for a minute. We were trying to be reassured that that wasn't their theme." For associate professor Fields and two colleagues, the combination of references to colonial Africa, faux cheetah skin, antlers and a bar named "the Bull's Eye" sounded like the designers were glorifying imperialism and big-game hunting. "Colonialism is essentially racism," said associate professor of sociology Shamsul Alam, whose father lived under British colonial rule in Bangladesh. "Before you colonize, you have to have the ideology of moral superiority." "The English perfected the art of ... taking control of land and natural resources and obliterating of native cultures and training people to be waiters," said Fields. "They built lovely buildings when they did it. They built lovely furniture." "In Africa, hunting for thousands of years has been an integral part of what people did," said adjunct professor of anthropology Jim Phillips, who lived in former colonial countries in the Caribbean. "Now what colonialism did was impose a whole other class for whom hunting was sport. That's fine unless it destroys the livelihood of those that is supports." Owner Doug Neuman calls the comments a serious misunderstanding. "This is not the imperial slave hotel," said Neuman. "It's so not who we are." He says there will be no African hunting trophies or faux cheetah skins anywhere. The one small footstool that was the inspiration for visions of hanging cheetah hides has been scrapped. Some antique antlers, not animal head trophies, will decorate a part of the restaurant along with English ceramic ware. The "Bull's Eye" bar will be filled with vintage games along the lines of darts and Chinese checkers. "It's not a shooting gallery," said Adetuyi. "There's no bull's eye on the dance floor." Adetuyi said her design firm, Candra Scott & Associates, has learned what it's like to do business in Ashland. "We've done hotel work for a long time and you can't please everyone," she said. "But nobody's ever said anything. Whereas with the most important building in a small town, people feel a part of it." Today's Edition : News | Sports | Business | Weather | Tempo | Classifieds Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 2000, Medford, Oregon USA