Why We Ask That You Stay at the Omni Providence

The Society of Architectural Historians' 2019 Annual International Conference will be held in Providence, Rhode Island, at the Rhode Island Convention Center. The Omni Providence will be the conference’s headquarters hotel and is connected to the convention center.

It is vital not only to the financial success of this meeting, but to the fiscal health of SAH, that our members choose to stay at the Omni Providence during the conference.

Why?

Organizing the annual conference requires several years of planning by the office in Chicago long before the year-long process of configuring the scholarly content of the meeting begins. In order to keep the cost of the conference as low as possible for our members, SAH contracts each year with a hotel, promising to fill a specific number of sleeping rooms at a preferred rate. This is a complex symbiosis that ultimately benefits SAH, our conference attendees, and of course the hotel. It also allows us to keep conference registration rates from rising substantially.

If SAH were instead to rent meeting space in the hotel/conference center at the rates required for an organization our size, the overall registration fee for everyone would have to go up significantly. As it stands, those who stay at the conference hotel are, in effect, helping to pay for the meeting space by paying for their accommodation. Those who opt to stay elsewhere are in effect attending a conference subsidized by other members. The Society is depending on you to support the conference by booking your stay at the Omni Providence.

The financial consequences are enormous if SAH does not meet its contractual commitment to fill enough sleeping rooms. The Society could be liable for hefty attrition fees for unused sleeping rooms, totaling in the tens of thousands of dollars.

Please help us avoid these steep financial penalties and keep conference registration fees down by staying in the SAH room block at the Omni Providence. The Hotel & Transportation page on the SAH website includes instructions about how to reserve an SAH room at the Omni Providence online or by telephone. 

Staying at the Omni Providence is also the most convenient option for YOU!

• The hotel is connected to the convention center, making it quick and easy for you to get to and from the conference.

• It is located downtown and within walking distance to Brown University, Rhode Island School of Design, and Providence College.

• The hotel’s on-site restaurants (including late-night menu and lounge), coffee shop (opens at 6 am), and room service (6 am–2 am) give you a great variety of food options, no matter the time of day or night.

By choosing to stay at the Omni Providence, you will help us maintain the same high standards that you’ve come to know and expect from the Society’s premier scholarly annual program. Thank you for your support.

Victoria Young
SAH First Vice President
Chair of the 2019 Annual International Conference

Pauline Saliga
SAH Executive Director