There’s even more to like about San Antonio these days. Long a favorite for its spectacular River Walk, a meandering 15-mile stretch of riverfront lined with restaurants, green spaces and cultural attractions, the city is blossoming with new and improved ways for groups to experience the city’s distinctive Southwest flair.
Bigger and Better
For meetings, the biggest news on the scene is the recently completed $325 million expansion of the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center. Unveiled at a gala grand opening last spring, the end result is a 1.6 million-square-foot structure with 514,000 square feet of contiguous exhibit space, 70 meeting rooms and the largest ballroom in Texas. The guiding impetus behind the expansion was to make San Antonio more competitive in the convention market, according to Casandra Matej, executive director of the San Antonio CVB.
“Not only did we want to grow our market share and handle larger meetings, but we also had the problem of groups who were outgrowing us,” she said. “We wanted to retain those meetings that had been loyal to us over the years. Before the grand opening we had already booked 34 groups we could not have accommodated without the transformation. This reflects 600,000 room nights. It’s also enabled us to host the NCAA Men’s Final Four, which is coming here in 2018.”
The expansion has also enabled the center to host two conventions at once and offer greater flexibility to attendees for networking and connectivity, she added.
“We know that people want to gather in small groups for pop-up meetings, so we utilized different nooks of the building to create intimate places for this,” she said. “Plus we needed to make sure there are plenty of outlets in the seating areas. It’s like what’s happening at airports—people want to be able to sit with the phone or their computer.”
Flexibility also played a part in everything from food concessions, which include a pizza kitchen with indoor and outdoor seating, to the function areas. Among the most innovative meeting spaces is the 4,000-square-foot Cantilever Room, a dramatic architectural feature extending over the street and adorned with various seating options that include bar stools and lounge furniture. The 54,000-square-foot Stars at Night Ballroom, with its ceiling of 1,643 sparkling LED lights, is divisible into three rooms, each with separate front-of-house and back-of-house access.
Located on River Walk, the design of the convention center embraces its location with a wraparound balcony and walls of windows framing views of the river and downtown.
Further reinforcing its sense of place are aspects such as the Hall of Texans, with its life-size bronze statues of such iconic figures as Sam Houston and LBJ, and the Lonesome Dove Room, where dark leather furnishings and Western art give a distinctly local feel to the meeting space.
“When you walk into our building, you know you are in San Antonio,” Matej said.
Among meeting planners who were favorably impressed by the new facility during its grand opening celebration was Susan Fischer, strategic account manager for Experient.
“The increased size and flexibility of the exhibit space, the enhanced traffic flow, as well as having the largest ballroom in the state, definitely sets the convention center apart,” she said. “This, combined with the city’s overall appeal, is a big win for San Antonio and the meetings landscape.”
The convention center’s adjacent original structure is being demolished to become part of another major downtown redevelopment project, Hemisfair. Built for the 1968 World’s Fair, the site is being repurposed into a series of urban parks that will include preserved historic buildings from the fair as well as festival areas, gardens and outdoor cafes.
“The upcoming developments in Hemisfair over the coming years will make it possible for visitors and locals alike to enjoy the downtown even more,” Matej said. “It will also be a green space within footsteps of the convention center that we can use for outdoor events.”
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Plans are in the works for a new hotel to be located in Hemisfair across form the convention center. San Antonio’s Historic Design and Review Commission has given preliminary approvals for a 184-room hotel to be operated by Choice International’s boutique Cambria brand. Plans are calling for it to include a ballroom, rooftop bar with swimming pool and high-end restaurant.
Other properties in the area include Four Diamond Omni La Mansion del Rio, located along the banks of the River Walk. With its 338 guest rooms and 18,780 square feet of meeting space, the Omni also offers its Mokara Spa for groups.
Inviting Venues
San Antonio abounds in off-site venue choices for groups, including the famous River Walk, which was expanded from three to 15 miles three years ago. Its central downtown section is a popular site for barge tours, including those with private dinners held onboard. Groups can enjoy appetizers and entrees on the barge and then disembark to enjoy coffee and dessert at La Visa Terrace, an event venue with a spacious outdoor deck offering a magical illuminated view of the Alamo just below.
Among the city’s newest venues is the Mays Family Center located at the Witte Museum, a natural history museum. Accommodating receptions for up to 1,000, the center hosts major traveling exhibitions and also offers an adjacent garden.
Housed in a magnificent Spanish Colonial Revival mansion surrounded by gardens, the McNay Art Museum, which exhibits modern European and American artwork, offers several atmospheric event spaces, including the Octagon Room and a tiled courtyard.
For a shopping spree, groups can visit The Shops at La Cantera.
Pearl Pleasures
San Antonio’s Pearl district is fast becoming a dining and entertainment magnet for visitors, offering such attractions as the San Antonio campus of the Culinary Institute of America, craft breweries, a farmers market and art studios.
“Pearl is the hippest area of San Antonio, with a lot of chef-owned restaurants where we can do dine-arounds and progressive dinners,” said Morris Goen, owner of Goen South Events, a local DMC. “The district also has the DoSeum, a children’s museum just a couple of years old. We have rented it out in the evening for adults who really get into the interactive experiences as much as kids do.”
Another of Goen’s favorite venues in the Pearl is Hotel Emma, a new boutique hotel converted out of an 1894-era brewery where architectural elements are cleverly incorporated into the hotel design.
The hotel’s 6,100 square feet of meeting space includes such imaginative venues as the Elephant Cellar Ballroom adorned with vintage storage tanks and bottle-filling wheels turned into light fixtures.
Among the many restaurant venues in the Pearl is Southerleigh Fine Food & Brewery, where chef Jeff Balfour puts a modern spin on Texas’ multicultural cuisine, complemented by the in-house brewery’s rotating menu of craft beers. Up to 20 guests can dine in the circular-shaped Silo, a private dining room that was once a grain silo.
Hill Country
Just north of the city, the Texas Hill Country beckons with meetings-friendly resorts and plenty of recreational options for groups, including golf, hiking and wine tasting. For day trips, a popular option is a visit to Natural Bridge Caverns.
“It’s a beautiful limestone cavern where you can go underground for a tour,” Goen said. “For groups who are a little more adventurous, they also have a ropes course and zipline.”
Another favorite excursion is Fredericksburg, a quaint town settled in the 19th century by German pioneers that has become known for its burgeoning number of wineries.
“We will often do the wineries on a full-day tour out of San Antonio,” Goen said. “It’s about an hour ride out there and we always have entertainment on the bus—it might be a comedian or an actor who gives the history of the area. The wineries are winning awards and putting Texas on the map as a wine destination.”
Among major resorts in the area is the JW Marriott San Antonio Hill Country Resort & Spa, a 1,002-room property with a full-service spa and 288,000 square feet of indoor and outdoor meeting space. Its newest addition is the River Bend Pavilion, which has 5,000 square feet of indoor space, plus a large deck and adjoining event lawn with a covered outdoor stage.
Other choices include the Hyatt Regency Hill Country Resort and Spa, which offers the top-rated Windflower spa, 27-hole golf course and over 100,000 square feet of indoor and outdoor meeting space. Located on 550 acres, the 498-room La Cantera Resort & Spa, part of the Destination Hotels collection, recently emerged from a property-wide renovation and features a new 10,000-square-foot ballroom.
