Five of this building's 12 floors would house a 110-unit "extended stay" hotel in the heart of Lexington's downtown.
Lexington, KY - The proposed CentrePointe development in downtown Lexington will boast a second hotel, a 110 unit "suite hotel with [an] extended stay component," on the block that is already slated to house a Marriott family brand elsewhere on the block.
During a presentation to the Courthouse Area Design Review Board, Bingham Greenebaum Doll attorney Darby Turner, who represents the project's developers, the Webb Companies, stated the extended stay hotel would be in the previously proposed apartment building along Main and Upper Streets.
That hotel, like the other proposed hotel on the block, will be branded with one of Marriott's family of names. Which brand exactly won't be known until the coming weeks, developer Dudley Webb said. "They'll tell us," he said of Marriott. The one brand Webb knows it won't be on the block is J.W. Marriott. The flagship Marriott hotel was talked about in the beginning as a possibility for the hotel along Vine, but has since been ruled out, he said.
The new extended stay hotel along Main would take up five floors of the proposed 12-story building while the previously proposed apartments will comprise six floors and the ground floor will house retail space, architect Joe Rabun of Atlanta-based Rabun Architects told the Courthouse Area Design Review Board.
Webb said the building will have separate entrances and elevators for residents and hotel guests.
Rabun said during the meeting that Starbucks could add a second downtown location for the coffee chain, which would go in the breezeway on Main Street between the 10- or possible 12-story office building and the apartment/extended stay hotel. Webb stated afterward that it would be "something like Starbucks."
The previously announced 18-story hotel building on the corner of Upper and Vine would be 11 floors of hotel while the top seven floors of the building would offer condos. Webb said he expects the price points on those condos to be announced soon.
The Courthouse Design Review Board approved the changes with a lone dissenter, Lexington architect Graham Pohl of Pohl Rosa Pohl.
"I voted against because the most sensitive portion of the whole site is the Main Street portion, and that in my view is the one portion where they needed to push it further than they have been pushing it. I think they've done some really great things with that elevation with the materials and texture and breaking down scale, but as I pointed out I think it could be better [along Main Street]," Pohl told Business Lexington after the meeting.
Pohl said he stopped short of proposing a conditional authorization contingent upon wanted changes along Main Street as he felt the architects were working toward a design he felt would be suitable.
Webb said the first building on the block would be complete in a little more than a years' time as the office building, which could add floors if more tenants express interest, would be done by the end of May or start of June next year. The hotels would be ready by the fall of 2015.