Oceanview Motel SAVED
If you have been following our channel for the past year you would know we have been working extremely hard to save the Oceanview Motel.
Located at 7201 Ocean Ave in Wildwood Crest, the Oceanview Motel was built in 1963 and opened as the Admiral Motel before becoming Admiral East and finally The Oceanview Motel.
The motel was built by Lou Morey, a contractor who designed many of the mid-century motels in the Wildwoods.
What made the Oceanview Motel so unique was its lobby. It featured a “blast-off” roof, made up of a gigantic gable whose two sides don’t meet. It’s called a “blast-off” roof as it’s trying to mimic a jet plane taking off.
In the 1960s space travel was all the rage and so it inspired many of the motel designs down in the Wildwoods such as the Satellite motel. This style was called Googie or Doo-Wop
The Wildwoods, especially Wildwood Crest used to be littered with Doo-Wop motels which is why we are known as The Doo Wop Capital of the World.
Over time many, of the iconic motels, roughly 80 of them, were torn down to become condos.
Some of those motels included places like the Carousel Motel, Nautilus Motel, Hi Lili Motel, Tahiti Motel, Satellite Motel, and more.
Wildwood Crest lost much of its identity when these motels were torn down.
Fast forward to January 2022. Over time the Oceanview Motel had fallen into disrepair after years of neglect. The new owners, from the original sale, wanted to tear down the historic significance of the building, and the lobby, and turn it into condos.
This is where the Wildwood Video Archive and the Doo Wop Preservation League stepped in. Using all the resources we had, we started a campaign online to bring attention to the matter.
The WVA recorded over 5 videos, and 7 articles and even set up groups to visit the pending planning and zoning meeting.
An architect was brought in to help sketch out new ideas of how this building could look with the lobby. Team members even submitted the Oceanview for New Jersey’s historic register landmark program.
After over eight months of hard work, we can finally announce that WE SAVED IT.
The Oceanview motel was just purchased by an investor group which will not only save the historic lobby but will also make it into one of the premier motels here in South Jersey.
Its name will be changed from the Oceanview motel to the Madison Resort.
This investor group owns many businesses in Cape May County including the Montreal Beach Resort, Harry’s Ocean Bar and Grille, and The Madison House.
While there isn’t much information about the resort, from the mockup we can see how beautiful the project will look once it’s done.
[NOTE from the editor]
This motel wouldn’t have been saved if it wasn’t for your support on this channel. For those eight months, all we have been doing is pushing to save this building.
Thank you for all the letters you wrote to city hall, thank you for sharing all my videos and getting the word out, and thank you for wanting to keep the history alive!
Be sure to stay tuned as we will be bringing you updates on the project as they happen.
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Below is our latest Wildwoods Construction update.
Check out these other Wildwood videos and articles.