Affordable Hotels In Carolina Beach|"Downtown Brooklyn Gets New Hip Hotels"

Source             :    usatoday.com

Category        :    Affordable Hotels In Carolina Beach

By                  :    Nancy Trejos

Posted By     :    Hotels Carolina Beach NC

Affordable Hotels In Carolina Beach

Brooklyn's year-old Barclays Center has drawn the likes of Jay-Z and Barbra Streisand, the Brooklyn Nets and this year's MTV Video Music Awards. The arena is part of a larger complex called Atlantic Yards, which will soon be filled with residential, office and retail space. Throw in a thriving arts and cultural scene anchored by the Brooklyn Academy of Music, plus a dozen or so universities, and you've got a hotel developer's dream. "It's an underserved market," says Hung Luk, chief operating officer of the Lam Group, which has developed InterContinental Hotels Group's Hotel Indigo, officially opening today in downtown Brooklyn. Brooklyn has become the hottest New York City outer borough in the last few years, but much of the activity has been concentrated in Williamsburg, a subway stop away from lower Manhattan. Now, development is spreading throughout the borough, making Brooklyn a primary destination rather than a second thought for travelers visiting New York City. For city residents, it can also be a more affordable place to live, with easy access to Manhattan."Hotel Indigo is just the latest in a series of new hotels exploding onto the Brooklyn scene, and it's easy to see why," says Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz. " Whether business or pleasure, Brooklyn is tops by any measure in offering memorable opportunities to guests, from shopping and dining to culture and the arts."

Right now, there aren't enough hotels to house those guests, city officials and developers say. Gregory Atkins, project manager of a 200-room lifestyle hotel near the Barclays Center planned by Second Development Services, says Brooklyn has 4,000 hotel rooms for 2.6 million people. "Take your average Midwestern small city. How many hotel (rooms) do they have? They have more than Brooklyn," he says. "There's a tremendous market demand for Brooklyn alone." From January 2011 through this June, 13 of the 53 hotels that opened in New York City were in Brooklyn, according to NYC & Company, the city's official marketing and tourism organization. Another eight are expected to open in Brooklyn by 2016. The New York Marriott at the Brooklyn Bridge in downtown Brooklyn, a large full-service hotel, had long dominated the borough's hotel market. Then Williamsburg landed two boutique hotels: the 72-room Wythe Hotel and the 64-room King & Grove Williamsburg. Now, developers are looking to other parts of Brooklyn that are as up-and-coming as Williamsburg once was, such as Bushwick and Sunset Park, where the 76-room Hotel BPM, named for the musical term "beats per minute," opened last year.

That's partly because land is generally cheaper in Brooklyn, about 50% less than it would cost in Manhattan, says Scott Barone, president of Barone Management, which is planning a 204-room full-service hotel near the Barclays Center. And, says Luk of the Lam Group, land in Manhattan is getting scarce. "There's only so much you can build in Manhattan," he says. New York City travelers are attracted to Brooklyn because visitors can often get rooms for less. The average daily rate this year through August is $167.96 in Brooklyn, vs. $261.29 in Manhattan, according to STR, a hotel research firm in Nashville. Bijal Panwala, owner of Hotel BPM Brooklyn, says it's not just about the money. "Our guests choose Brooklyn for Brooklyn rather than it being a cheaper option," he says. In many ways, downtown Brooklyn has become the next frontier for hotel development in the borough. The neighborhood has 1,000 hotel rooms now, and another 500 on the way, says Tucker Reed, president of the Downtown Brooklyn Partnership. The latest addition is the 128-room Hotel Indigo on Duffield Street, IHG's boutique brand, where rates range from $179 to $300.

The design of the hotel pays homage to the neighborhood's history as a haven for artists and intellectuals, says Mary Winslow, director of Americas brand management for IHG's Hotel Indigo brand. In the early 1940s, the nearby February House became a boarding house for writers, poets and performers such as burlesque dancer Gypsy Rose Lee, author Carson McCullers and poet W.H. Auden. Walk into the Indigo, and you think you're walking into an old vaudeville theater. In the lobby is a mural of a red velvet stage curtain and numbered seats. Next to a red velvet chair that guests can lounge on is a stage light. Murals on hallway walls show theater steps. A second-floor fitness center has a picture of the legs of dancers covering one wall. Rooms have murals of stage curtains. Some have murals of chandeliers on their ceilings. The paintings and photographs hanging on the hallway walls were chosen by the Lam Group in collaboration with the Brooklyn Arts Council.

"The murals, the colors, the food and beverage … it has to be rooted very specifically to the neighborhood story; otherwise, you feel like you're in Disney," Winslow says. That neighborhood story will continue to evolve. In addition to the Barclays Center, there are other developments on the horizon, including the BRIC Arts Media House, an arts and media complex, and the Polonsky Shakespeare Center, the new home of the Theatre for a New Audience. "It provides visitors in the area with all sorts of things to do that weren't necessarily here a decade ago," Reed says. "These will only prove to drive up, in my opinion, occupancy rates and demand for rooms."

Source:usatoday.com/story/travel/hotels/2013/09/19/downtown-brooklyn-hotels-barclays-center-hotel-indigo/2830615/