A showpiece of the Howard Johnson Company's efforts, the Darien facility was featured in the May 24, 1963 issue of Time Magazine. Cost of the excellently sited Motor Lodge in 1962 was over $1.3 million. According to an online inflation calculator that would amount to over $9 million in 2009!

Owned and operated by Darien Hospitality Group (now defunct?) from 1994 until 2008, the Darien HoJo's was one of several hospitality offerings in the outfit's holdings (see Mystic, East Lyme, and Harrisburg). Records indicate that a lease drawn up and signed in 1961 governed the Hospitality Group's right to the site until 2021. The land on which the Howard Johnson's was built had been owned by at least two old-money Darien families who created the partnership Ledge Road Enterprises to oversee rent collection and lease terms for the Howard Johnson's site.

By early 2006 parties involved were in ongoing negotiations to iron out new lease terms in order to redevelop the highly desirable 5+ acre site. Since the facility faced I-95 (a coveted parcel for a retail center), the long-lived HoJo's and its abandoned since 2000 Restaurant were demolished in November of 2008 and scheduled to be replaced with a strip center and Whole Foods Market.