Marriott’s Le Meridien comes Melbourne
Marriott International is planning to bring its Le Méridien brand to Melbourne’s CBD.
It will be located on the site of Melbourne's former Palace Theatre at the top of Bourke Street, just a stone’s throw from Parliament Square.
It will be designed in the style of the brand’s mid-century hotels with 235 rooms on offer. It will have Le Meridien's signature Le Meridien Hub, as well as a daytime coffee house that turns into a cocktail bar at night.
Le Meridien Melbourne will also feature the 90 seat restaurant Cuisines.
It will also offer a 210-square metre function space and three breakout rooms as well as a heated swimming pool and fitness centre.
Marriott has teamed up with with Chinese developer Jinshan Investments to build the 12- storey hotel above what was once one of Melbourne's premier live entertainment venues.
It will keep the Palace Theatre’s 1912 art-deco façade but demolish the rest of the building to make way for the $100 million hotel.
It will open in 2020.
Jinshan was given the the right to demolish the Palace Theatre in 2016 after buying it from receivers for $11.2 million in 2012.
The new hotel will be the first Le Meridien to operate in Australia in over a decade.
"We're very optimistic about the Melbourne hotel market," Marriott's Australian and NZ head of development, Richard Crawford, told The Australian Financial Review.
The Meridien Melbourne will also bolster Marriott's foothold in Melbourne.
Mariott is expanding in the city, opening a new W Hotel to be owned by Japan's Daisho, located at Collins Arch.
It will be a $1.25 billion mixed-use development.
Marriott is also the company behind one of Melbourne's flagship hotels, the Westin Hotel, as well as the Sheraton Melbourne.
All this is part of Marriott’s expansion plans which will see it opening 50 hotels in Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific by the end of 2021.
by Leon Gettler, February 15th 2017.
