Watch this space: Sydney’s hot new hotels
The only way is up for new hotels wanting a piece of Sydney’s prized real estate.
When the 35-room Little Albion Guest House in Sydney’s Surry Hills opened in July 2018, it was seen as heralding a new wave of small neighbourhood hotels similar to those of Melbourne’s laneways.
With strong pared-back services and community connections, on-trend design and architecture, such boutique gems mimic London’s townhouse hotels and the brownstone conversions of newly fashionable NYC boroughs. But several months later, Little Albion was acquired by the fast-expanding Crystalbrook Collection for a reputed $30 million, which Paul Fischmann, its original owner, and founder of 8Hotels, clearly couldn’t refuse.
Now the go-small trend seems to have momentarily stalled in the NSW capital, with the award-winning 29-room Paramount House Hotel, also in Surry Hills, being a rare exception, and Camperdown’s The Collectionist, with 39 themed guestrooms, a wild-child success. It’s all to do with the cost and availability of Sydney real estate and the profit models of giant developers. Why go small when you can go tall and reap more financial rewards? And, in some cases, why go new when you can strip back and rebuild or rebrand an existing property?
Sofitel Darling Harbour, a member of the French-owned Accor chain, launched in late 2017 as the first Sydney new build since the 2000 Summer Olympics. Its successful opening, fortuitous location adjacent to the International Convention Centre and sustained high occupancy levels are credited with sparking a mini-boom in openings, projected to peak in 2020. Thereafter, hotel industry trends forecaster STR predicts sustained growth to at least 2024, with 94 projects delivering 18,294 rooms under construction, plus 216 projects and 36,005 rooms in planning. According to Matthew Burke, STR regional manager for the Pacific, “This uptick in investment reflects the country’s strong performance, especially in major markets. As a whole, Australia’s occupancy has been at, or near to, 75 per cent for each of the past five years.” But some international operators have commented that the additional supply could take at least 12 months to absorb.
The 2020 landscape in Sydney will show the fruits of projects started around the time of the Sofitel Darling Harbour launch, and it’s shaping up as a buoyant time for the NSW capital. But there are refurbishments and upgrades to consider too, such as the new wing at The Old Clare Hotel in Chippendale, beside the Kensington Street art and food hub. This mix of a former pub and the Carlton United Breweries administration buildings opened in 2015, and the addition of seven Art Deco-styled chambers crafted into the floorplan of Silvereye restaurant, which closed in 2016, gives guests a third category of accommodation, with blackbutt floors, cast-iron bathtubs, customised furniture, indigenous artwork and character trimmings. John Chesterman of Sydney’s Huppauf Chesterman Architects, who led the original project, has been involved in the expansion, which includes a refresh of the existing 62 guestrooms.
The big-shot examples this year include the 301-room voco Sydney Central, part of the mixed-use 430 Pitt Street development in the CBD. The build covers a 17-storey tower with a sloped roof and “garden waterfall effect”. Interestingly, it was originally planned as a Holiday Inn until developers Linzhu Australia decided on a more lifestyle-driven brand for this prime CBD site, close to the Capitol Theatre, George Street light rail link and high-end retail outlets in the Queen Victoria Building. It will be the fifth voco in Australia and the first in NSW. IHG has also just opened Crowne Plaza Darling Harbour on the corner of Sussex and Bathurst Streets as a 160-room hotel and residential tower of 95 apartments.
Did someone mention Darling Harbour? Already hitting its stride is TFE Hotels’ brand-new 145-room Vibe Sydney Darling Harbour on Sussex Street, which opened late last year with a mantra of “Manhattan by design, Sydney by location”. The accommodation has been conceived in the style of New York lofts with oversized windows; there’s a rooftop bar and heated pool, and a street-level diner with an Asian-inspired menu that nods to the surrounding Chinatown quarter.
Nearby, Marriott International’s 450-room W Hotel Sydney, also featuring 140 serviced apartments, is on track to open in the fourth quarter of this year on the site of the former IMAX Theatre, tucked between the western distributor and an elevated freeway on the southwest edge of the CBD. The futuristic 25-storey glass building with extravagantly rounded curves has already been dubbed an eyesore in a flurry of social media posts. It has been variously likened to a snail, a shoe and a pencil sharpener, rivalling the instant nickname of “toaster” given to No 1 Macquarie Street at East Circular Quay, a blocky “kitchen appliance of a building” that caused widespread controversy in the late 1990s. The IMAX redevelopment, with such undulating forms that it’s known as The Ribbon, is said to be costing $730 million and includes retail and recreational elements. According to architectural firm Hassell, “The building’s organic, flowing shape appears to peel up the surrounding roadways and manipulate them into a new structure that complements the changing landscape between the high-rise city to the west and Darling Harbour to the east.”
The jury may still be out regarding the W Hotel Sydney’s design profile but Darling Harbour is occupying a new place in the sun, partly linked to the success of the International Convention Centre, which will host more than 1300 major events through to about 2026 and result in increased demand for adjacent accommodation. Another factor is the redevelopment of the Darling Quarter to a cultural precinct of arts projects, free events on the village green, elevated dining options and entertainment facilities such as the Monkey Baa Theatre Company.
The much-touted 66-storey Ritz-Carlton Sydney hotel and residential development at The Star casino and leisure complex in Pyrmont has hit continued obstacles, however, primarily due to its scale, cited as eight times the permitted height, and likely to cause “unacceptable visual impact”, overshadowing public spaces and parkland. The plans have been twice rejected by the NSW Independent Planning Commission, which found the economic benefits for jobs and tourism did not outweigh the “overly intrusive” 237m tower construction, also described as “inconsistent with NSW planning principles”. City of Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore has described the IPC’s decision as a “win for the community and the integrity of the planning system”. But with a development budget of more than $500 million and clear economic opportunities, it’s likely 2020 will see further debate on the project, especially as NSW Planning Minister Robert Stokes has said, “We’re working on a bold new masterplan for Pyrmont that will allow it to be the city’s next entertainment and innovation hub.”
But even with Darling Harbour, Pyrmont and Barangaroo ripe for more leisure development, and estimates that about 4600 rooms will be added to the Sydney market by the end of 2022, there’s been a concurrent side-shift by smaller operators to the city outskirts and closer suburbs, without any sacrificing of style or amenities. The Veriu brand continues to choose slightly off-radar locations, such as Green Square and Broadway, for its fresh and modern neighbourhood-centric properties. The 128-room Marsden Hotel has recently opened at Burwood to Sydney’s west with rooftop bar and “roving Aperol trolley”, an upscale grill helmed by Conor Plunkett, formerly of Sydney’s acclaimed Quay, and an “artisan patisserie”. Forty-five minutes to the west of the CBD, Accor took a punt 18 months ago with its $140 million William Inglis-MGallery by Sofitel, in the Riverside Stable precinct next to Warwick Farm racecourse. The five-star, boutique-scale property has proved a hit with the racing set and is in prime position for eventual access to Western Sydney International Airport at Badgerys Creek.
In 2021, a significant opening on the radar for design aficionados will be Ace Hotel Sydney, the first in Australia for the US boutique operator, which recently celebrated its 20th anniversary and is expanding into Asia with its upcoming opening in Kyoto, Japan, conceived by Kengo Kuma, architect of the Tokyo National Stadium, key venue for the 2020 Olympics. Kuma’s design over the site of the former Kyoto Central Telephone Office includes renovating parts of the original 1920s building. The Sydney property is also a heritage hybrid with 264 guestrooms, rooftop bar designed by go-to firm Bates Smart, and predictably hip food and beverage outlets. It’ s being created in conjunction with diversified property, capital and investment company Golden Age, founded by Jeff Xu in 2006, and one of the leaders on the NSW development scene. Like its Kyoto stablemate, it’s not a big, shiny build in the city centre. Ace Hotel Sydney will be an 18-storey mixed conversion using the foundations and original early 20th-century warehouse facade and low-rise floors of Tyne House on Wentworth Avenue in Surry Hills. It will be within cooee of the well-rated little Veriu Central, with its arty 1920s décor and robust neighbourhood credentials, and, by my reckoning, a 10-minute stroll from the still-popular Crystalbrook Collection’s Little Albion. In Sydney, as ever, what goes around, comes around.
Susan Kurosawa is The Australian’s Associate Editor (travel).
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