Comments on: More on the Bricktown Holiday Inn Express

By: slackmeyer

slackmeyer — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 16:24:20 +0000

That’s correct, Patrick, and Sweeney acknowledged that during our interview. His point, however, was that they could have simply shopped for a different flag to avoid spending $2.2 million on a 2-year-old hotel. Likewise, Sweeney didn’t try to suggest the exterior of the hotel on Classen is anywhere close to being an acceptable model for Bricktown. He was very proud, however, of the changes underway inside the hotel – and I must admit, the new interior isn’t what you would expect inside that exterior.

By: Patrick

Patrick — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 03:31:05 +0000

From good ole Wikipedia:

“Global Hyatt Select Hotel Group is closing the AmeriSuites brand and creating a new brand named Hyatt Place. This process began in 2006 and they currently have 15 or more hotels open nationwide with 70+ to be completed by the end of 2007.”

By: Patrick

Patrick — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 03:29:18 +0000

Other chains have had to comply with Bricktown’s restrictions. What makes Bricktown unique is that it isn’t just a bunch of franshise-appearing Mc-buildings like you’d find at any retail/restaurant corridor in the city. The restaurants adapt the warehouse theme. Look at Abuelos and Hooters….they’ve adapted to the warehouse structure just fine. Even IHOP has.

If we start building a bunch of Mc-buildings in Bricktown, the area will lose its charm, and will become just any other restaurant/hotel strip.

And I don’t buy Sweeney’s comments that their spending $2.2 million to rebrand the Amerisuites is proof that they do quality work. They’re having to do that because the Amerisuites name is being phased out all across the country.

By: Keith

Keith — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 23:09:07 +0000

If the guidelines are basically at around 90% brick at this point, I wonder why they don’t just take the next step and ban the use of stucco altogether, except for in the rare case of a style where real stucco is warranted?

I would think that the other 10% could be an attractive material such as stone, concrete, steel, etc. – or just use more glass. Hell, I’m no architect, but there has to be some cheap material out there that looks cool on the exterior of a building – In other cities, I’ve seen cement board, metal panels, plastic panels, fake concrete stone, all sorts of shite. Brick and stucco are not the only 2 exterior facing building materials in the world, even in my limited sphere of insight on the subject.

It would be nice to see a little creativity and/or ingenuity in affect. Must we be 5-10 years behind on everything?

By: slackmeyer

slackmeyer — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 22:03:01 +0000

There certainly was a difference in how this matter was handled versus how the McDonald’s application went last summer. I’ll blog about that later this weekend.
-Steve

By: Anthony

Anthony — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 18:02:54 +0000

Or maybe they are genuine in their desire to create what is right for the district……

By: Shane

Shane — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 15:26:40 +0000

This was really interesting to me, looking inside the meeting and getting inside the heads of all the people who are involved in this. I think it’s fascinating how easily the developer gave in to Urban Design… They must have had that speech prepared in advance. In any case, it does seem that they are willing to make it as good as they have to in order to build.