Hospitality Design - December 2011 - 51

places: new orleans

perspectives

Clockwise from top left: A rendering of the blue and white guestroom of the soon-to-open Saint Hotel; the club level at Windsor Court; and commissioned artwork behind the bar at Ste. Marie recreates a map of the restaurant’s neighborhood during the late 1800s.

and crafting a funky neon-lit lounge with oversized furniture and a courtyard space that boasts the city’s largest outdoor whirlpool. “The hotel is designed to appeal to a younger traveler who is more tech savvy,” says owner Joe Jaeger, who steered the redo as the group handles design city around it. New Orleans to me is a constant surprise, so we wanted to capture that idea of mixing edgier urban elements with a sophisticated sense of the romantic, of creating guestrooms that offer a warm cocoon from all of the excitement outside.” Moving along Canal Street toward the river, one more property is undergoing a major overhaul, to the tune of $17.7 million. The Chateau Bourbon, housed in an 1849 D. H. Holmes department store that was later converted into a hotel by HRI Properties in 1995, is being reﬂagged as the 254-key Hyatt French Quarter, with interior design by Looney & Associates. The building’s exterior façade is to be painted with a new color scheme, and interior renovations include everything the guest sees and touches, from guestrooms and corridors, to a remodeled pool and courtyard, ﬁtness center, bar, and a new restaurant, currently under concept planning by Blau and Associates of Las Vegas. Says Michael Medzigian, CEO of Carey Watermark Investors Incorporated, who acquired the hotel in a joint venture with HRI: “We were attracted to the Chateau Bourbon due to what we saw as attributes that are unmatched in the local market—a location that is second to none at the corner of Bourbon and Canal Streets, a historically signiﬁcant structure that offers the largest guestrooms in the French Quarter all with 12-foot-tall ceilings, and what will be the only Hyatt hotel in the French Quarter.” in-house. “The look we wanted was clean and crisp to offer a transition from a traditional-looking building to new modern interior.” The courtyard, he adds, represents a middle ground that reﬂects New Orleans as a place where people “gather and socialize.” The hotel company will next tackle a similar project with the old St. Louis Hotel. Nearby, sprucing is underway at the Royal Sonesta, which is readying for a new restaurant by celeb chef John Besh in March. In September, Windsor Court completed renovations on its club level, with design by Dallas-based Flick Mars featuring a soothing palette of gray blue tones and celadon. “The aesthetic was derived through a tailored blend of English tradition, which is the signature of Windsor Court Hotel, and French vogue, which is the hallmark of New Orleans,” explains Flick Mars partner, Matt Mars. Finally, in celebration of its 125th anniversary, the family-owned Hotel Monteleone is renovating its exterior and upgrading its interior with a revamped pool area and new guestroom soft goods, as well as a refurbishment of its famed Carousel Bar by San Francisco-based Puccini Group. Still to come: a yet-to-be-named restaurant in which the Puccini Group rethinks the Hunt Grill Room’s tryst vibe by opening up windows to the street and lightening the palette. The concept for both the restaurant and bar—traditional meets contemporary with a new lounge connecting the two, outﬁtted in marble tables and plush leather chairs— will “preserve the charming essence of the French Quarter, pay homage to the Monteleone family, and awaken the imaginative spirit with small whimsical touches in the artwork and accessories,” says Puccini Group’s chief creative ofﬁcer, Robert Polacek.

Minor Nip and Tucks
Smaller French Quarter developments include those by the New Orleans Hotel Collection, which has re-designed the worn St. Ann/Marie Antioinette Hotel and named it Le Marais, updating the 64 guestrooms

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Hospitality Design - December 2011
