Caribbean
After suffering one of the area’s most devastating hurricane seasons in 2017, the Peter Island Resort in the British Virgin Islands recently announced its grand reopening following a six-year renovation. The private island resort’s upgrades include new accommodations and state-of-the-art facilities, including 52 room-, suite- and villa-style accommodations.
The property has also expanded its meetings and events facilities to accommodate groups of up to 180 people with a new 3,000-square-foot oceanfront conference center with two event lawns and a prefunction open-air porch. The new meeting facilities will include a dedicated, onsite kitchen, flexible indoor spaces and scenic outdoor areas.
Hotel Indigo Grand Cayman, a new hotel from IHG Hotels & Resorts and Dart Properties in the Cayman Islands, is set to open this April. The 282-room property will include the island’s first rooftop lounge and provide convenient access to popular Cayman Island experiences such as the Seven Mile Beach, Stingray City, Camana Bay’s high-fashion boutiques and the National Gallery’s Caymanian arts displays.
[Related: Noteworthy New Hotels and Renovations in the Caribbean and Cancun]
The property features over 7,500 square feet of meeting and event space, the largest of which being the 6,000-square-foot Azure Ballroom, able to accommodate nearly 600 attendees. Other event spaces include the 1,050-square-foot Cobalt Meeting Room, located across the hall from the Azure Ballroom, that can accommodate over 100 guests and be segmented into two separate spaces.
Florida
In the Hyde Park district of South Tampa lies the Epicurean Hotel, a food-focused hotel that recently completed a $21 million expansion. Located across the street from the Epicurean’s main 137-room hotel, the expansion adds 51 brand-new guest rooms and suites, a private lobby, an additional meeting and event space and a rooftop terrace.
[Related: Waterfront Venues and Attractions in Tampa, St. Petersburg and Clearwater]
The expansion’s new meeting spaces include the Chateau Room, a 794-square-foot room able to accommodate up to 50 attendees and featuring an eight-foot video wall. The new 590-square-foot Cask Room features a built-in plasma TV and is ideal for up to 30 attendees. Both rooms feature large windows and open onto the 1,138-square-foot rooftop Vineyard Terrace, a unique option for private receptions and celebrations of up to 130 attendees. Planners will also have access to over 5,200 square feet of flexible event space in the main hotel building.
North Carolina
Located in the heart of Asheville overlooking the Blue Ridge Mountains, Embassy Suites by Hilton Asheville Downtown opened its doors at the end of last year, becoming the first and only full-service, all-suites property in Asheville.
The hotel brings over 7,000 square feet of meeting and event space to downtown Asheville and can accommodate up to 400 attendees at once. The property’s spaces include the 4,704-square-foot Blue Ridge Ballroom and the 1,232-square-foot French Broad Conference Center. Additional meeting spaces will be available at the property’s new restaurants set to open early this year, which include E’Terie, a lobby-level restaurant and bar, and Soprana, an Italian brick-oven pizza rooftop restaurant.
Planners can instantly reserve 10-25 hotel rooms for their group, and a donation of $500 will be made to one of the hotel’s local partner organizations for every $10,000 spent by any group contracted before March 31, 2024.
Everything’s Bigger in Texas
A new half-billion-dollar hotel and convention center is officially open in Arlington, Texas. Situated between Globe Life Field, home of the Texas Rangers, and AT&T Stadium, home of the Dallas Cowboys, the $550 million Loews Arlington Hotel and Convention Center stands at 21 stories and brings another 888 guest rooms and luxury suites to the area. The property is centrally located between Dallas and Fort Worth and is just 10 minutes away from the Dallas Fort Worth International Airport.
[Related: Arlington, Texas, Awaits New Loews Arlington Hotel and Convention Center]
Loews Arlington Hotel is connected to the new Arlington Convention Center and the existing 300-room Live! By Loews Hotel. Collectively, the Loews complex in Arlington now has 1,188 rooms and close to 300,000 square feet of meeting and event space, including the largest hotel ballroom in North Texas at 51,000 square feet. The complex also has additional meeting rooms ranging in size and can accommodate up to 5,000 attendees.
In addition to state-of-the-art meeting space and unique dining experiences, guests may enjoy countless amenities including a full-service spa and salon, resort-style beach club with two pools, cabanas, fire pits, a water slide and a man-made sandy beach.
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