Dive Brief:
- IHG Hotels & Resorts’ 390-key InterContinental San Antonio Riverwalk property, currently under construction in partnership with Scarlett Hotel Group and Trailbreak Partners, will open this summer in the Texas city.
- A $158 million redevelopment of the former Wyndham Hotels & Resorts property at 111 E. Pecan St. in San Antonio’s central business district, the hotel will feature enhanced luxury amenities and design, IHG detailed in a Monday release.
- The InterContinental Hotels & Resorts brand is one of six in IHG’s luxury lifestyle portfolio. The hotel company is among several of its competitors expanding in the burgeoning segment.
Dive Insight:
After three years in the works, the InterContinental San Antonio Riverwalk hotel is set to open this summer.
The property will feature redesigned guest rooms and suites that showcase “a new sense of worldly luxury and refined ambiance,” according to IHG.
Designed by Omaha-based architecture firm Leo A Daly in conjunction with the internal IHG design team, the hotel is inspired by “the golden age of Hollywood,” IHG said. It will feature mid-century architecture and furnishings with colorful velvet furniture and “rich finishes” of brass, marble, dark wood, cognac leather and glass.
The hotel will offer an 8,000-square-foot ballroom, flexible meeting space with views of the San Antonio skyline and other event spaces. Other luxury amenities at the property will include a 1,800-square-foot fitness center, a Club InterContinental lounge and on-site guest services like dry cleaning and childcare.
The hotel will feature four restaurant and bar concepts by Heartwood Hospitality, including an American brasserie, a rooftop pool and cocktail lounge, a grab-and-go cafe and a lobby bar.
The opening is part of IHG’s continued push in the luxury lifestyle segment, which is “particularly growing fast,” according to the hotel company's fourth quarter 2023 earnings report.
In January, IHG appointed Leanne Harwood as senior vice president, managing director for Luxury & Lifestyle Americas to drive growth of the company’s six brands in the space, including InterContinental Hotels & Resorts.
IHG is among peers like Hyatt and Hilton expanding in the segment to cater to changing traveler demand.
Matt Frankiewicz, SVP of Development—Americas for IHG Hotels & Resorts, previously told Hotel Dive that the company is expanding in San Antonio, particularly, because it is “a growing market, with very little new luxury supply introduced in the past few years.”
The city presents the “unique opportunity to capture the unaccommodated demand in the luxury space — both for leisure travelers as well as the city’s robust business and convention industry,” he said.
San Antonio was among 20 U.S. markets that reached more than 100% group business recovery in Q4, according to research by Knowland and Amadeus.
