City Inn, the privately owned UK hotel company, plans to open new hotels in the major European capitals within the next few years. 'We are looking at cities like Paris, Rome, Madrid and Barcelona,' Sandy Orr, executive chairman of City Inn, said at a press conference announcing a new City Inn in Amsterdam.
City Inn, the privately owned UK hotel company, plans to open new hotels in the major European capitals within the next few years. 'We are looking at cities like Paris, Rome, Madrid and Barcelona,' Sandy Orr, executive chairman of City Inn, said at a press conference announcing a new City Inn in Amsterdam.
The Amsterdam City Inn marks the hotel company's first development on the European continent. The EUR 150 mln hotel will be built on the IJ river adjacent to Amsterdam's central station. The site is part of Oosterdokseiland, a new inner city complex being developed in the Dutch capital by Bouwfonds MAB, the second largest commercial property developer in the Netherlands.
The hotel, which is scheduled to open in 2010, will have 550 rooms and state-of-the-art facilities. 'We prefer to build new hotels so that we can benefit from the latest standards of construction, ergonomic design and technology’, Orr said. 'It is difficult to find suitable locations in city centres, but we believe in this business model. Customers want modern facilities but at the same time they want to be in the centre of town. We feel the Amsterdam site is a great location for our hotel.'
City Inn already has four hotels in London, Bristol, Birmingham and Glasgow and is planning two more in the UK. The Amsterdam hotel will be designed by British architect Rab Bennetts who also designed the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford.
The total cost of the Oosterdokseiland site, one of the biggest urban development projects in western Europe, is put at EUR 710 mln. Besides City Inn, Oosterdokseiland will also comprise a library, a conservatorium, 80,000 m2 of office space, 12,500 m2 of retail, 1600 parking spaces and approximately 300 residential apartments.