Both New York and Miami have plenty of noteworthy hotel news, but Los Angeles isn’t sitting still either.
Downtown LA has come a long way from the pioneering days of The Standard Hotel, with the additions of both Ritz-Carlton and JW Marriott at L.A. Live, the InterContinental in the tallest building west of the Mississippi, and more. In the first months of this year alone, it welcomed both The NoMad (the redevelopment of the 1923 Giannini Place with 241 rooms and a rooftop pool) and the 268-room Hotel Figueroa, built as a women’s hostel in 1926. Development is showing no signs of slowing down either.
Over in Beverly Hills, Waldorf Astoria opened in a swank tower next to the Beverly Hilton, itself long subject of plans for redevelopment. IHG’s Kimpton Hotels is getting serious about its expansion into Europe and Asia, but that didn’t stop it from adding two LA hotels: Kimpton Everly and Kimpton La Peer. Nobu opened the doors to its seaside Ryokan in Malibu, without something as pedestrian as online reservations for its 16 rooms and suites; rates are simply listed as starting at $2,000 during ‘preferred periods’, with a two-night minimum.
The list of projects for the next few years is long and varied. We look at a selection of what’s still to come for Los Angeles hotels.
First up, scheduled for a September opening is AC Hotel Beverly Hills. Set in an 11-story building, the hotel will have 142 minimalist rooms, a breakfast restaurant, and a small rooftop pool. Meanwhile, a short drive northwest on La Cienega Blvd, SLS Beverly Hills – part of Luxury Collection – will complete a full renovation in the next few months. That includes a refresh of its 234 rooms and 63 suites, adding two new suite types along the way, all in time for its tenth birthday in November.
At the rate it’s expanding, The Hoxton is turning into a permanent feature no matter the city we turn to. New York is coming soon (in Williamsburg), there is Portland and Chicago, a third London hotel a little further in the future, and as you’d expect, Los Angeles. Joining the Downtown boom, The Hoxton is taking over the Los Angeles Railway Building at Broadway and 11th, which dates back to 1920.
Inside there will be 174 rooms with vintage details, like green velvet chairs and saloon-style doors to the hallway. Expect the usual public spaces on the ground floor, but also a rooftop pool – the first for the brand, but clearly an LA essential – along with a restaurant. Opening is scheduled for the end of the year.
Also aiming for the end of the year – and literally next door – is Proper Hotel Downtown LA, in this case taking over the former LA Press Club and Case Hotel building. Only a touch smaller than The Hoxton, it will have 151 rooms, but also throws in ground floor restaurants and one on the roof, with pool and bar.
With its Hollywood residences and a downtown hotel, Proper will complete a triple early next year with Proper Santa Monica, a 271-room hotel a few blocks from the ocean. Like Hollywood, interiors will be by Kelly Wearstler, along with three restaurants, one more rooftop lounge and swimming pool, as well as extensive retail and meeting space.
Well established in Miami and adding a second hotel – in Times Square – in New York, Edition Hotels has promised The West Hollywood Edition should open this year on the corner of West Sunset Boulevard and North Doheny Drive, though we wouldn’t be surprised if it tips into 2019. Its location puts it just a few blocks east of Soho House LA, practically waving distance from the respective rooftop bars. There will be 190 rooms and suites, 20 residences, F&B outlets, a nightclub, and pool – on the roof, of course.
Head further east on Sunset and you’ll drive by The Jeremy West Hollywood, to be converted into a 1 Hotel in the next few years (other eco-luxury 1 Hotels are coming to Cabo San Lucas, Sanya (China), and Sunnyvale).
Speaking of Soho House, its expansion around the world includes another Los Angeles outpost, taking us right back downtown. A 1917 brick building will be transformed into 110,000 sq ft of Soho House spaces, which unlike its West Hollywood and Malibu locations will include bedrooms bookable by the general public. Opening is set for April 2019.
On Pico Boulevard, the Morrison Hotel – featured on the Doors’ 1970 album cover – may get a new lease on life with a tower addition to create a 245-room hotel with a music theme, including an underground night club and top floor pool deck and lounge.
The area near the LA Convention Centre and Staples Centre will get hundreds and hundreds of additional hotel rooms over the next years. That includes plans for the Park Hyatt Los Angeles, with 184 rooms and suites, due in 2020. The hotel will be part of the gigantic Oceanwide Plaza development, which includes residences, retail, and a host of other amenities.
Like Downtown, Hollywood is undergoing a major transformation, with hotels under construction left and right and an expected increase in local population of well over 50 per cent over the next several years. One tiny pocket that shows how much is happening is where Wilcox and Selma Avenues meet: both Dream Hotel Hollywood and Mama Shelter are still relatively new, but several projects are underway in the immediate vicinity.
First is Thompson West Hollywood, bringing 200 rooms and suites in a ten-story building just west of Dream Hotel. The ground floor will have a restaurant, bar, and outdoor plaza, while the ubiquitous rooftop level has F&B outlets and an outdoor pool with deck and fitness centre.
While its planned New York outposts eventually became the launch of Arlo Hotels, millennial-focused tommie hotels – like Thompson part of parent company Commune – is trying again here. Lower-case tommie Hollywood should have 212 rooms when it opens around the start of the new decade.
Literally next door to Dream is the planned Selma Hotel, like Thompson and tommie a project from the Relevant Group. Here there would be eight stories with 114 rooms and suites, commercial space on the ground floor and a rooftop pool.
Adding to its hotels in Chicago and Boston, The Godfrey is planning to open on Cahuenga Boulevard. Around 200 rooms will find their way into a seven-story building, with the familiar set of amenities (rooftop pool anyone?) as well as a projection wall for film and videos in the courtyard.
Intent on hitting both hotel hotspots is citizenM, with properties in the pipeline in both Hollywood and Downtown. The Hollywood version will be 14 stories tall next to the famous circular Capitol Records building, with 216 rooms and a 13th floor outdoor terrace. Slightly shorter at 11 stories, citizenM Downtown will have 315 rooms on the corner of 4th and Spring Street.
Part of a $2.5 billion regeneration scheme, Fairmont Hotels will take on management of the Century Plaza hotel, first opened in 1966. The Fairmont Century Plaza will have 394 rooms and suites (including its concierge level Fairmont Gold), along with 63 condominiums and two 46-story towers with 290 private residences. Expect a range of F&B outlets, retail, a two-acre garden, a 14,000 sq ft spa with fitness and rooftop swimming pool, and over 23,000 sq ft of meeting spaces. Meanwhile, the next several years may also give us more on the plans to redevelop The Fairmont Miramar in Santa Monica.
Paul J DeVries
