The property is a conversion of a hotel the company had started building last year that was intended to be named Lyric, in honor of the region’s blues-music heritage. Trump Hotels executives hadn’t yet visited the site when they announced plans for the first Scion hotel on June 5 in New York, according to Chawla.
‘Far Advanced’
“They didn’t realize how far advanced we were on the construction,” he said. “In our lobby, we were going to have music performances. They said, if you’re going to have that, you have to have a two-story lobby. That’s hard to do when you have a floor above the lobby. You can’t just go in there with a jackhammer and knock out concrete.”
Other changes call for redesigning the spa and installing a kitchen closer to meeting space to speed up food delivery, according to Chawla.
“They felt the buildings were a little too spread out the way we had them,” said the developer.
One thing remains the same: “You won’t see the name Trump anywhere in any of the properties,” Chawla said. “That’s against the rules.”
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.