The hotel features a rooftop pool and bar!
For three years, Sarasotans have been eyeing the growing, 18-story hotel tower at the gateway to the John Ringling Bridge.
Now, they can use it to overlook Sarasota.
The 255-room Westin Sarasota will welcome its first guests Friday when it has a soft opening. The grand opening is planned for sometime in September. The rooftop pool is reserved for hotel guests, but its neighboring roughly 130-seat bar offers a 360-degree view of the city for anyone willing to pay for a drink or a meal to enjoy one of the most stunning backdrops in Sarasota. The view stretches over Sarasota Bay to the barrier islands, glimpses up the North Trail and gives spectators an unadulterated, breathtaking look at downtown.
The Westin, along with its sister condo tower known as The Vue, collectively have been one of the most anticipated and hotly debated developments in Southwest Florida. The new hotel adds much-needed beds for tourism and boosts the area’s capacity for large meeting events, but critics have blasted the towers for their proximity to street traffic and for tarnishing the view of the bay.
The Westin Sarasota itself has a very peaceful vibe. Guests are greeted by simple double doors that act as a hobbit hole of sorts from the outside into Westin’s world, said Jim Donovan, the director of sales and marketing for the property. There’s a subtle, modern coastal theme to the décor that uses glass, wood and fabric patterns to convey the feeling of waves and water.
Guests won’t see a single fish at the site, Donovan said, but they’ll still feel a sense of paradise. It’s quietly evident in the flowing patterns of dishes speckling the wall at its three-meal Evoq restaurant, the living wall of plants in the lobby and the chandeliers made of drinking glasses that just barely resemble jellyfish.
“There’s an anticipation with the community about the building and what’s in it,” Donovan said. “They always could see the outside. They see that it’s a little bit different, but the excitement is going to be when they get to inside with the living wall and with the theme of the waves and the floor-to-ceiling windows. And when they hit the roof, literally, that’s just going to be exciting.”
The Westin is the second in a string of new downtown hotel properties. It follows the Aloft by Starwood, which opened in February 2016. The 162-room Art Ovation Hotel an Autograph Collection by Marriott is next in line and tentatively slated to welcome guests in November, according to information from Visit Sarasota County. A 19-floor, 180-room Embassy Suites by Hilton and the 89-room Sarasota Modern: A Tribune Portfolio Hotel in the Rosemary District are also both expected to open next year.
That surge, along with a revamped hotel on Longboat Key and new properties in the Nokomis and Pinecraft area, will bring more than 1,000 new rooms to Sarasota County in less than two years. That’s more hotel growth than the region has seen in more than a decade, said Virginia Haley, president of Visit Sarasota County. Many of these projects, the Westin included, fell prey to the Great Recession, but now they’ve returned in force.
“I think having these hotels built particularly in and around the downtown Sarasota area sends a message about the incredible vitality of our downtown,” Haley said. “You wouldn’t have thought about that kind of investment a long time ago.”
Donovan expects 35 percent of the hotel’s business to be group events, but he’s also targeting leisure and business travelers and the entire Sarasota community. Rooms run from the low $200′s to $499 a night depending time of year, but The Evoq restaurant and The Roof Bar and Eats on the 19th floor are for everyone. The two spots share an eclectic menu with dishes such as Maine lobster potpie, toasted barley risotto, avocado salad and smoked short rib with ancho chili barbecue seasoning and served with a beer-braised potato. Guests can get the same fare on the rooftop as in the Evoq’s downstairs dining room and outdoor patio.
The Westin boasts 26,000 square feet of meeting space and the hotel can accommodate one large event or up to three small ones at a time. The hotel has 15 suites, a roughly 20-piece workout room, a spa that seemingly does everything but hair and a special grassy area for anyone who brings their dog along for their stay. Guests can take a shuttle to the beach or downtown. Snorkel sets and fishing poles are available as well as daily planned group runs across the nearby John Ringling Bridge.
