By chance was this the Ace Hotel of Portland, Seattle, New York, and Palm Springs? I know they were looking very seriously at a building in Gastown but in the end the thing didn't pencil.
No, it was a Vancouver entrepreneur who had bought a 6-8 story structure on Pender around International Village.
the W in san francisco was a little brighter than seattle - the common areas were all dark but they had bright white furniture which helped a little bit