Dubai: Just a day after it was announced that Starwood had been acquired by Marriott for $12.2 billion (Dh44.80 billion), the latest property from the premium brand in Starwood’s crown was unveiled in Dubai: St Regis Dubai, on Shaikh Zayed Road.
At the top end of Starwood’s 11-strong portfolio of brands, the St Regis is a five-star hotel with 234 rooms, of which 52 are suites.
It is the first of three Starwood properties due to open next to the Dubai Canal project at the heart of the Dh11 billion Al Habtoor City entertainment and hospitality development.
The 1,000-room Westin and the 356-room W are planned to open simultaneously in the first half of 2016.
Executives were mum on the Starwood-Marriott development, which came late on Monday afternoon UAE time. “At hotel level, it’s business as usual and no disruption at all,” Candice D’Cruz, director of marketing for the complex, told Gulf News on Tuesday morning.
Despite the fact that it is situated in what is still essentially a building site, general manager Andreas Oberoi, now on his third St Regis opening, emphasised the hotel’s location as a defining feature, alongside the service — each room has its own 24-hour butler, for example.
“It’s maybe not the easier approach, but on the other hand, in three years when we look back we will say it was definitely the right decision to open the St Regis first [before the Westin and W], being the leader. We have discussed this internally, whether we should go first. Dubai is not a destination where things go bottom-up, it’s more top-down, so we approached it with the luxury first.”
Everything in the hotel, from the eight restaurants and bars to the spa and conference rooms, is fully operational, he added. There will not be a single room in the French-inspired Beaux Arts building “that has not been test-slept”.
Feeder markets for the hotel are primarily the GCC, Europe, the UK, the Far East and Australia. “Australia is a market that I think is very interesting,” said Oberoi, referring to Emirates stop-over passenger traffic. “But again, St Regis is for the global traveller, the connoisseur that basically travels the world.”
He also expects to see 50 per cent of business coming from paying customers on Starwood’s SPG loyalty programme. “I think that’s achievable here as we launched the co-branded credit card with SPG, Emirates [Airline] and Emirates NBD.”
Next up for St Regis in the UAE — in addition to two existing hotels in Abu Dhabi — is its first polo resort, also with Al Habtoor. Near Al Ain Road, the 134-room hacienda-style resort with three polo fields and stables is due in the fourth quarter of 2016. “There will be more news to come,” said Oberoi. “From a St Regis perspective, we are very excited to be opening our first polo resort.”
