Hartford Marriott

[ctman987]

Today the Marriott Hartford Hotel had it's ribbon cutting ceramony which was attended by Hartford Mayor Eddie Perez, CT Govenor M. Jodi Rell, Len and Mark Wolman of the Waterford Group which is the master developer of the site, J.W. Marriott Jr of Marriott Hotels International, all the employees of the hotel and convention center, and members of the local and national press.

The hotel has

409 rooms

22 stories

Vivo which is a spirited trattoria featuring an Italian wine bar and Milano market expo kitchen, 4800 square feet, 180 seats

Crush Lounge which is a 1500 square foot lounge

Glo which is the rooftop fitness center and pool

Starbucks

12 meeting rooms totaling 13, 500 square feet

8300 square foot ballroom.

Hundreds attented the grand opening ribbon cutting ceramony.

Pictures coming next week!!

Any thoughts

[beerbeer]

I'm checking in next Wednesday. I'll try to take a photo or two of the view from the upper floors.

[uconn99]

I'm checking in next Wednesday.  I'll try to take a photo or two of the view from the upper floors.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Yes please do!

I asume this is a 4 star hotel?

[MadVlad]

Those prices they were quoting were really expensive. I think I remember them saying $169 a night?

[ctman987]

The hotel has

409 rooms

22 stories

Vivo which is a spirited trattoria featuring an Italian wine bar and Milano market expo kitchen, 4800 square feet, 180 seats

Crush Lounge which is a 1500 square foot lounge

Glo which is the rooftop fitness center and pool

Starbucks

12 meeting rooms totaling 13, 500 square feet

8300 square foot ballroom.

People waiting and preparing for the ceramony

The hotels workers lined up

The ribbon cutting (In the picture are Hartford Mayor Eddie Perez, J.W. Marriott Jr, Len and Mark Wolman who are the heads of the Waterford Group the developer of the hotel and also present but not pictured CT Govenor Jodi Rell)

The hotel lobby

2nd floor area outside meeting rooms and ballroom

Crush Bar

Vivo: Italian restaurant

[Florida]

Nice clicks... is this a Marriott Convention hotel... if so, look for great things happening in Hartford over the next few years... conventions = economic development!

Here in Tallahassee we've had a Marriott Convention Center hotel on tabs for about 5 years... I won't be built because the developer is a dead beat... he's locked the city into this contract they signed with him... legal battle is imminent.

I'll attach a rendering of how ours is supossed to look if it is ever to be built... but Congrats to Hartford for the grand opening of a nice Hotel! This is a city on a roll!

[MadVlad]

The best part is that this Hotel is expandable....

[uconn99]

I know orginally it was going to have 700+ rooms. If they expand are they going to go up or out?

[SOCOM]

They definetly won't expand up. The expansion would be in a second, smaller tower connected to the current building, resulting in an L shaped building.

[Cotuit]

A hotel definately wouldn't expand up, too disruptive. An additional tower, taller or not, will make for a more interesting looking cluster of buildings anyway.

[Florida]

smart idea to make it expandable.

[ctman987]

The hotel would expand towards the highway in a second tower housing an addiotional 300 rooms with a second ballroom. Originally the hotel was planned for 700 rooms but a market analysis showed that the market could only support 400 rooms so 409 were built. The Waterford Group has the go ahead to build the second part of the hotel whenever they are ready and feel that the market can support it.

This is a tricky situation because there is somewhat of a lack of rooms in the downtown area. The Marriott brough 409 new 4-star rooms, the renovated Hilton now brings 392 more 4-star rooms but after that there is of the course the Goodwin Hotel but they only have 124 rooms, the new Holiday Inn Express Downtown has 96 rooms but they are not a 4-star property and the Crowne Plaza has 350 rooms but the hotel needs to be renovated like the Hilton was and that is one of the next priorities in the city.

Also just drove by it yesterday and saw the Italian restaurant Vivo was packed with people-must be a good sign!!

[beerbeer]

You can see the crane from Hartford 21 but I don't know if the tower will break the top of the BOA Building from this angle. This was pretty much my view from the 14th floor except most of the Travelers Tower is cut off from that low.

[beerbeer]

This is out the window of my room at night. I could have really used a tripod.

[uconn99]

Those are some nice views for sure. I wish St. Paul-Travelers would invest some money in making that building look more apealing to the skyline.

[Luca Brasi]

I agree. That building is horrible -- both in the skyline and at street level. No matter which side you approach from, you always feel like you are at the back of it, it adds nothing to the streetscape and it is impossible to find the entrance. It has always looked like a parking garage to me.

[beerbeer]

Here's a bonus pix. The Marriott from Constittion Plaza.

[SOCOM]

Beautiful. I just wish we could take a wrecking ball to that horrible Travelers plaza building. It's been wrecking the street and skyline for decades.

[MadVlad]

Beautiful.  I just wish we could take a wrecking ball to that horrible Travelers plaza building.  It's been wrecking the street and skyline for decades.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The problem with that is, with our luck, if that building got demolished, Travelers would move all those jobs to Orlando or something...

[Theophrastus Bombastus]

I saw that "Waterford Properties" filed for bankruptcy 12/18 - any relation to Waterford Group?

[tombarnes]

Is the building referred to as the Travelers' Plaza the former Sonesta on the left side of the photograph above?

[MadVlad]

The Plaza building is the big, brown, square building that has the large glowing umbrella on it...

[Mr. Brass Bonanza]

It used to say "NOEL" on Christmas Eve until Travelers caved to political correctness idiots. It also said "NFL" the night Rowland signed that bogus agreement to bring the Patriots to Hartford.