Construction is set to begin in November on the latest hotel project in Portland’s central city. The 197-room Moxy Portland will rise to 12 stories above grade on a former surface parking lot and food cart site at 585 S.W. 10th Ave., at the corner of Alder Street.

The building was designed by DLR Group for Minneapolis-based owner/developer Graves Hospitality, which is making a foray into what it considers a vibrant hotel market in Portland.

“There are a lot of incubators of some industry-leading concepts in the lifestyle business here with all of the independent hotels,” said Ben Graves, the company’s CEO. “It’s a very independent vibe, and we love that.”

The metrics of the Portland market and its projected growth drew the company to the city. After digging around and submitting offers for various sites, Graves was introduced to the Goodman family, whose Downtown Development Group owns the 3/16ths-block site in the burgeoning West End area.

“For the type of hotel that we’re doing, there’s not a better location in Portland,” Graves said.

Marriott International’s Moxy brand targets lifestyle-conscious millennial travelers, and the Portland location will enter a market that includes recent offerings with similar concepts. They include: the 204-room AC Hotel Portland Downtown, which opened last year, and two Hilton hotels that opened earlier this year – the 153-room Canopy in the Pearl District, and the 299-room Porter Portland Hotel, which is part of Hilton’s Curio chain.

In addition, the 180-room Radisson Red is slated to open next month in the Broadway Tower, and a 220-room Hyatt Centric is under construction a block west of the Moxy site. Despite the apparent saturation of the hotel market, Graves Hospitality is optimistic about the health of the market and continued demand for rooms in the city.

“There weren’t a lot of hotels developed between 2002 and a couple years ago, so a lot of it is just catching up with the demand that’s been growing over the last decade,” said Matt Mering, the firm’s director of development.

Longtime pent-up demand for rooms, Graves says, has led to local hotels running at occupancy rates of around 85 percent, a number that could decrease 10 to 15 percent and still be considered very healthy.

“The supply will all be absorbed in the market,” he said. “It’s just an amazing amount of growth happening in this marketplace.”

Even with the strength of the market, Graves Hospitality underwrote the project under the assumption that it will take some time for business to ramp up. Along with development and equity partner KCB Real Estate, the firm is committed to being vested in the project for the long term.

“We’re taking the 15-year view on this, not the three-year view,” Mering said.

The 71,000-square-foot building is being constructed on a compact 7,500-square-foot parcel by general contractor Howard S. Wright, a Balfour Beatty company. Urban Resources Inc. is the owner’s representative and project manager for the project, which is funded by clients of Washington Capital Management. Construction is slated for completion in August 2020.

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North Dakota-based Brandt Hospitality Group appears to be moving forward with plans to build a pair of hotels on 6.91 acres of property in Beaverton, a bit south of the intersection of U.S. Route 26 and Northwest Cornell Road.

The Beaverton Planning Commission last month voted unanimously to approve plans for a project that calls for construction of two Marriott-branded hotels, the AC and the Element, on property that consists of three separate tax lots. Combined, the hotels would offer 224 rooms. A pair of separate restaurants, one 5,600 square feet and another 4,700 square feet, also would be built.

“This is a very, very good project,” Commissioner Gerry Uba said during the July 25 meeting. “It’s good for our city, it’s good for the area, and as fellow commissioners have said, I personally like the design. They improved the design, with all the changes, including the parapets and the color changes. It’s just beautiful.”

On Aug. 17, the Planning Commission’s approval became final because no appeals were filed. Brandt Hospitality Group may now finalize design and apply for building permits. Previously, during a meeting in June, commissioners requested a number of revisions to the design.

“Looking at your revised drawings and considering where we were nearly a month ago, I think you guys have done a nice job in responding to our concerns,” Commissioner Terry Lawler said during the July meeting. “I think it’s a really advanced design.”

The site, shaped somewhat like a pork chop, is bounded by Northwest 158th Avenue, Greenbrier Parkway and Blueridge Drive. The property is zoned for industrial and commercial uses, and sits near buildings occupied by Columbia Sportswear, Body and Face Solutions, Nike and Papa’s Pizza.

Concept plans drawn up by North Dakota-based ICON Architectural Group were presented to commissioners by Brandon McDougald, a LEED Accredited Professional with Kimley-Horn of Salt Lake City. The drawings show two four-story hotel buildings, each with a distinctive, branded entryway.

The AC Hotel will occupy the northernmost portion of the site, and offer 117 rooms. The Element will take up the southwest portion, and offer 107 rooms. The two restaurant pads would sit in the southeast corner.

Based on city requirements, there will be approximately 333 vehicle parking spaces and 16 covered bike parking spaces.

The AC Hotel will be rectangular and have light-colored stucco exterior cladding. The entryway will be a darker gray and feature a prominent bump-out feature.

The Element, meanwhile, will be L-shaped and also features prominent bump-outs. But in contrast to its neighbor, this entryway will be slightly recessed.

Several commissioners asked McDougald about existing or future plans for the restaurants.

“There is some question as to the timing of when those restaurants will be built,” he replied. “But the developer does have the LOI from two restaurants they’re talking to right now, so we don’t anticipate construction of those restaurants will trail too far behind the hotels.”

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One of the challenges in building a hotel is the larger-than-usual number of interested parties. In the case of the AC Hotel Portland at 888 S.W. Third Ave., at least five groups have a stake in the $50 million design-build project:

• Design-build contractor Mortenson had the initial idea to build a hotel at the site, and has had its designers involved from the earliest stages.
• Marriott International owns the AC Hotel line. Marriott is partnering with Sage Hospitality for development of this and two other U.S.-based AC Hotels.
• Developer McWhinney, out of Denver, has invested considerable capital.
• And because the Portland Development Commission sold the land for the project at a premium, it has set targets for minority participation and sustainability.

“You do end up with a lot of opinions,” he said. “But they all wanted this one to stand out and be a different kind of hotel than the standard traveler.”

A long-term hold

The full quarter-block lot at the corner of Southwest Third Avenue and Taylor Street had been grass for two and a half decades before the PDC’s board voted in 2014 to sell it to Mortenson for $2.5 million. The Minnesota-based builder has a large Seattle office and a growing Portland one.

The new hotel has been identified by Sage and Marriott as a long-term investment.

“The targeted cycle is 20 years,” Ervan said.

Sage already operates two successful downtown hotels. The AC will feature its art program and kitchen services by its Sage Restaurant Group. The kitchen will serve a range of tapas plates, in keeping with the Spanish theme.

There are 204 guest rooms and 1,600 feet of public meeting space. The structure is post-tension concrete with minor steel inside the elevator core. The exterior is white brick with some composite metal panels. The brick was insisted on by the Portland Design Commission, Ervan said.

Mortenson has a complete mock-up of an AC room in its temporary office on Southwest Third Avenue. This practice helps in testing out minor tweaks to the finishes, and in informing new tradespeople as they arrive on site.

“Any time you have a repeat of hundreds of the same situation, a full mock-up is very beneficial,” Ervan said. “The Marriott flag requires it, and it’s become kind of an industry standard in hospitality, and a little bit in health care.”

Design details

There are five room plans, though they all feature the same neutral colors and sleek, legless furniture (the pieces do have tiny, hidden legs, Sage spokeswoman Amber Evans said). Mostly the rooms differ by sleeping arrangement. Each floor has a “corner king” unit, located along the white, storefront lantern pattern along the southwest-face corner – each with a distinctive 180-degree view.

Rooms will be priced according to the usual factors, with view chief among them. Other price-affecting forces include the time of year and vacancy around town. Rates for an average room at the AC Hotel will probably run between $150 and $250, Evans said.

Much design mojo has gone into selecting lighting and earthy, complementary tones as well as features to meet Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design silver standards. The units have deep-dark laminate, vinyl-plate flooring – floated for soundproofing. The vinyl covering that coats the concrete walls – made of recycled materials – aids with sound capture, as well as by contributing LEED points. Other soundproofing measures include sound board in the bathrooms. Most of the rooms also have double-layered drywall with an acoustical channel running between the two, pulling drywall away from the studs to form a kind of false wall.

The industry standard soundproofing rating (STC) for rooms is 45-50. Here, the team is working toward a rating of 58, the standard for Sage Hospitality (Marriott’s acceptable STC score for rooms is 52).

Quietude is very important to travelers, Evans said. Lack of it is consistently ranked as one of the biggest complaints at hotels. The view is critical too, as is wireless Internet.

“Anything above the eighth (story) has a phenomenal view,” Evans said. “The east-facing rooms have a phenomenal view of the Willamette River and Mount Hood. The west-facing have great views of the city.”

To fit a professional aesthetic, coloring on the three art pieces that will adorn the rooms – procured from local artists via Instagram – has been dulled somewhat. Evans said the hotel is targeting the “entrepreneurial, spirited younger traveler who has an appreciation for finer things.”

The 13 stories bump right into the allowed setbacks and all five adjoining buildings. The height of 130 feet is about all that’s allowed for the site under Portland’s height restrictions, which drastically decrease heading toward the Willamette River, starting about at the site.

The hotel is basically like any other AC Hotel around the world. But the lobby as well as the public and meeting spaces are where the interior designers attempted to bring in elements of Portland, Evans said.

“We don’t want people to go through the hotel – we want people to come to the hotel,” she said.

Room boom

The project is part of a hospitality boom in Portland.

Notable other hotel projects at various stages of development include the Hyatt Regency at the Oregon Convention Center, the Cornelius-Woodlark in downtown, the Canopy by Hilton, the Porter Hotel Curio at Southwest Second Avenue and Jefferson Street, the Hi-Lo Hotel at the former Oregon Pioneer Building, the Grove Hotel on Burnside Street, the Hampton Inn and Suites in the Pearl District, Hotel Chamberlin on Southeast Grand Avenue, the addition at the Northwest Portland Hostel, the Toyoko Inn at Third Avenue and Oak Street, and the expansion of the Jupiter Hotel.

Mortenson is also developing a hotel at the United Way site in downtown.

Mortenson hopes to hand over a fully-functional building by Christmas – everything down to the sheets on the bed. The hotel operations team should begin training employees, establishing networks in the building and adding furniture and dishes, etc. While other projects around downtown have languished as a result of the construction labor shortage, material delays and other issues, a tower crane at the AC Hotel has gone up and come down.

Despite the team’s consistent pace, Ervan thinks the project could have moved faster.

“It’s definitely been difficult,” he said. “It’s been the labor shortage, as much as the project size from a floorplate standpoint; both have been constraints to how fast we go. But also through the cash flow, as it’s drawn out, we’ve had to close out parts of the project. That’s important too.”

AC Hotel Portland

Address: 888 S.W. Third Ave.

Size: 120,000 square feet

Cost: $50 million

Owner: Marriott International

Construction start date: September 2015

Scheduled open date: Jan. 23, 2017

Design-builder: Mortenson Construction

Construction architect: SERA Architects

Key subcontractors: KPFF Engineering (structural), Cochran Inc. (electrical), TCM Corp. (mechanical)

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After an earlier effort in Corvallis to build a hotel on a prime riverfront parcel failed in dramatic fashion, a development team devised a plan that fit the height envelope while still providing the needed parking: They put the hotel on top of the parking, and secured a franchise with an upscale brand.

“I don’t think the hotel is terribly unique from a design standpoint, but it’s certainly an interesting development for downtown Corvallis,” said Vern McDonald, a member of the limited liability company that’s developing a 75-foot-tall Courtyard Marriott hotel at 115 S.W. First St. – what will be the second tallest building in town.

Crews with A&A Construction are now pouring the concrete superstructure and cap of the 136-stall parking structure. The second phase of construction will involve building the four-story hotel tower that will add 176 rooms to the city’s existing 800. Construction should conclude by summer 2017.

Though many of the rooms will be considered “upscale,” the project includes standard hotel fare – an off-lobby restaurant, 2,000 square feet of meeting space, a fitness center and a pool. The $20 million, half-block project is situated across the Willamette River from the Orleans Natural Area, and a short walk to the Oregon State University campus and downtown Corvallis’ many shops and restaurants. It’s also across the street from the 82-foot-tall Renaissance on the Riverfront mixed-use tower, the tallest building in town.

An earlier plan to build a $23 million Hyatt Place hotel on the site was shot down by the city council after vehement public opposition over using $4.2 million in public financing to build an accompanying parking structure. Without the subsidy, developers argued at the time, a hotel on the site wouldn’t work.

The parcel was purchased in 2014 for $2 million. Though partnering with the upscale Marriott line will mean higher room rates, McDonald says that decision wasn’t made simply to charge more per room.

“There’s a lot more to it than that,” he said. “We wanted to be more appealing to the traveling public and the convention-going public … It has to do with having a product type that the market wants to use.”

Regularly recognized for its livability, Corvallis has faced challenges where growth and economic development are concerned, said Tom Nelson, Corvallis’ economic development director. With such a small market, one hospitality project can quickly upset equilibrium.

The riverfront area, and Corvallis in general, is ready for another boutique project, he said.

“We feel that downtown especially is underserved by upscale hotels,” he said.

Tourism to the city has long revolved around two things: home football games and academic conferences. But that’s starting to change as more people visit for business unrelated to OSU, according to Mary Pat Parker, executive director of Visit Corvallis.

“I like to think we have three seasons now – spring, fall and now also, summer,” she said.

The project was designed by Jensen Fey Architecture and Planning of Seattle. Devco Engineering of Corvallis is the civil engineer.

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