Russellville restaurateur Deborah Hirsch, architect Jim Humphrey (left) and building project consultant John Street look AT plans Thursday for two hotels Hirsch is developing in downtown Russellville.

RUSSELLVILLE – What started as a lifestyle change for Deborah Hirsch and her husband in 2005 may be a game-changer for downtown Russellville.

Hirsch, as owner and head chef of the upscale Ariella Bistro restaurant on South Main Street, has already changed the dining climate in her adopted hometown. Now the New Jersey native is moving a block down the street for a development project that will make the restaurant seem like small potatoes.

The Hirsches used their private funds to purchase the former Southern Deposit Bank building and the former Duncan’s Drug Store building, which are on Main Street on opposite corners of the Fourth Street intersection.

Their bold plans promise to transform the quaint downtown.

Deborah Hirsch explained that both old buildings will be demolished in the next couple of weeks. The bank location will then be turned into a six-story, 46-room hotel called Hotel Gaelle and the drug store location will become an extended-stay hotel called Hotel Duncan.

Touring the site Thursday with architect Jim Humphrey and project consultant John Street, Hirsch enthused about her latest projects.

“I’m passionate about this,” she said. “I love to build things, and I want to invest in my own community.”

What she’s building now has the potential to transform downtown Russellville, home to a number of aging structures.

The two hotels, estimated to cost upwards of $5 million, promise to spruce up the downtown while boosting the local tax base.

“It will be a lot better than having boarded-up old buildings there,” said Humphrey, a Russellville native who now works out of Clarksville, Tenn. “Architecturally, the buildings will be stunning and they will clean up an abandoned space. The city will benefit from a tax standpoint, and you’ll have more employees downtown.”

Many of those employees will be working at the Hotel Gaelle (a French name meaning holy and generous) with a 250-person capacity ballroom on the top floor and exterior design features that fit the city’s historic downtown.

“I didn’t want to put something modern in the middle of the historic town,” Deborah Hirsch said. “This will look like something dropped there 100 years ago.”

Humphrey believes the Hotel Gaelle will have features that make it more attractive than the typical franchise hotel.

“This is not like a Holiday Inn,” he said. “It will be a boutique, upscale hotel. The rooms will have character, and the ballroom will be a perfect place for weddings and conferences. Deborah’s tastes are pretty neat. She likes things done nicely.”

That philosophy carries over to the five-story Hotel Duncan, which will cater to business travelers who need more than a one-night stay.

“It will have 12 extended-stay apartments that will be rented by the week,” Hirsch said. “Executives who are coming to Logan Aluminum for several days have no place to stay now. They would prefer to have a little apartment instead of a simple hotel room.”

In addition to catering to business travelers, the Hotel Duncan will have a sports bar on the ground floor.

“If you want to go to a sports bar now, you have to go to Bowling Green,” said Hirsch, who hopes the Hotel Duncan will be open by the end of 2018 or the beginning of 2019. The Hotel Gaelle is projected to open in the spring or summer of 2019.

And Hirsch’s plans to upgrade Russellville’s downtown don’t stop with those two projects. She and husband Richard have purchased the former News-Democrat & Leader newspaper building on the square, with plans to turn it into an ice cream parlor and coffee shop. They plan to have that open by May.

“I take my chef’s hat off and put on a hard hat,” Hirsch said about her building projects. “Russellville has a beautiful downtown square, but no one has invested in it. It’s deteriorating.”

She has done her best to change that since she and Richard moved into a historic, 6,000-square-foot house in downtown Russellville in 2005.

“We sold our property in New Jersey and took that money and decided to buy a holiday house that was centrally located for our family,” said Hirsch, 60. “I realized right away that there was no place to eat, so I started the restaurant.

“This is a beautiful little community. The people are very polite and hospitable. I come from an area where we had real traffic jams. Here a traffic jam is four cars at an intersection and everyone saying, ‘you go first.’

“I want to be a good neighbor and a good steward for the community. I want to help bring it back.”

Street, who retired from his job of overseeing public building projects in Florida and moved to Logan County, believes the Hirsch projects could be the catalyst for more growth in the community.

“This is the best thing that could happen to Logan County,” he said. “I hope this will catch on and others will step forward with other projects. Everyone is going to benefit.”