The West End has been waiting on 1 Hotel for several years. In a way, the wait is over, according to Robert Cohen, President of Perseus Realty LLC, half of the site's development team along with the Starwood Group, who said, "There is no more 1 Hotel [for this site]." Instead, there will be a 238-room Hilton Garden Inn with a 5,000 s.f. restaurant, and construction is expected to begin in June of 2012.
New design, Hilton Garden Inn:
Previous design, 1 Hotel:
Perseus Realty is currently applying for an amended PUD with the Zoning Commission, using the above (first rendering) working design by local architecture firm Shalom Baranes. "It's a first class design," explained Cohen. "It'll be the nicest Hilton Garden Inn in the country." Shalom Baranes principal Patrick Burkhart is in charge of the new Hilton Garden design, the 1 Hotel design was done by Chad Oppenheim of Oppenheim.
"Due to the climate in the last two or three years, we felt that a Hilton Garden Inn is a better use for the site. Nothing more than that," said Neil Jacobs, president of SH Group, Starwood's luxury hotel brand management company, formed in 2009. "With a 1 Hotel we were limited in the number of rooms we could get onto the site. We didn't want to compromise the brand, and commercially [the Hilton] is a better choice."
The 1 Hotel brand is alive and well, confirms Jacobs, who notes the construction of a new 1 Hotel currently underway on 6th Avenue in New York.
The Starwood and Perseus investment at M and 22nd Streets, NW is the site of the former Nigerian Embassy and Asia Nora - both razed in 2008. A restaurateur, yet to be selected for the 5000 s.f. space, will be largely dependent on qualities that are interactive and community focused, according to Cohen.
8/11 addition: previous project and design commentary, Former Swanky 1Hotel...
Washington D.C. real estate development news
8 comments:
Got to say I liked the old design better. Meh.
I agree. This new design is not as inspiring or "green" looking at the old design. You'd think with a name like Hilton *Garden* Inn, you'd want to see some of that ivy from the original design on your building. This just speaks to the shortsightedness of the 1 Hotel brand.
Awful. The neighborhood should oppose the modification of the PUD (if there was one)
It looks like something in Arlington.
OMG! I thought the old design was gorgeous and the new one is SO bland. How disappointing. . .
A Hilton???...obviously the developer doesn't really know the DC real estate market. Go across the street and try to buy a condo at 22 West for under a million. You'll get a quick lesson in DC real estate values! The neighborhood should oppose this hotel. A Hilton is inappropriate for this neighborhood.
I think the developer knows the market all too well, which is why it is a Hilton Garden Inn. If the condo market was back, as a someone suggested, then the site would be a condo. It is a difficult site and this project will be excellent for the neighborhood. To the others commenting about the design, if you donate millions of dollars, then I'm sure the developer would build it. Otherwise, this is what the market will bear.
I'm not an architect, but they both look to be mainly steel and glass, so why would it be millions more dollars? Yet the original is more of a standout. Agree with the comment about looking like Arlington.
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