A luxury 81-room hotel in Bridge Rd, originally to be operated by the multinational Accor group under its Peppers chain, is now set to be rebranded with a boutique style more suitable for Richmond and be open for business prior to Christmas.
The development at 203-207 Bridge, between Bosisto and Judd streets, will now be run by its owners, Amber Property Group, which will name it The Motley Hotel.
The group, owned by former Holden dealer Geoff Brady whose daughter Rachael is CEO, has triple arms of development, construction and hotel operation, says its chief operating officer Jevan Clay.
Amber opened a Sebel-branded hotel in Ringwood in March last year and is nearing completion of "a joint-venture in with a government department in Fitzroy.
"Geoff has decided to run [the Bridge Rd hotel] himself under a new independent name and make it a more tailored business for Richmond, rather than a standard hotel," Clay told the Inner East Review.
"We want it to be a really funky and vibrant place for people to stay or grab a meal before the footy."
The owner-builder-operators also hope to attract local patrons to the development's 85-seat ground floor restaurant and a rooftop cocktail bar with city views, tentatively dubbed The Threads, in a nod to the rag-trade history of the area..
The restaurant, to be named Miss Parker, after a head seamstress who apparently worked in the original building in the late 1800s, will offer "rustic, or Australian modern cuisine".
"We just want to make it mostly local, Victorian produce, everything seasonal, reasonably priced, and we're looking to really generate some great sales on those big football days...and then also really nice, upper fine dining experience at nighttime."
The hotel is expected to employ 50-60 part-time and full-time employees and the company will look to recruit many of them from the Richmond area, says Clay, himself a Richmond resident.
While the building is still an empty shell with a street frontage of scaffolding, Amber aims to have it completed in November and open from the first week of December.
Clay says the project, which has cost $35 million, is going to look "fantastic".
"We're arguably really heavily over capitalised," he says. "We're going to have 81 really beautiful rooms."
According to the COO, the hotel's original scheduled finish date of August-September was pushed back due to COVID-related and international factors currently plaguing the industry, including restrictions on construction worker numbers, a full week's lockdown, supply chain delays, increased costs and labour shortages.
However, Clay says the fact the company does its own building work has given it flexibility to work around supply chain issues.
"We've actually switched and almost all of our supply chains now are Australian-based," he says.
"Most smart builders are switching to Australian-based manufacturers. It might cost a little bit more, but the risk is far less because it's not being shipped over here."
With the Richmond area short on hotel accommodation, particularly around the Epworth hospital, according to Clay, the company expects strong patronage from hospital visitors as well as staycation and sporting event guests.
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