Hot Hotel Watch: Virgin Hotel Breaks Ground in NYC
The second-ever Virgin Hotel will be in Manhattan and is expected to open in 2018. (Image: Virgin Hotels)
Richard Branson is bringing his Virgin Hotel to New York City. The often visionary (and equally wacky) mogul/knight was here in person to kick off the construction of the new property, which was first announced back in 2013 and is now looking at a 2018 opening date. The geometric, glass cantilevered structure will rise 39 stories on Broadway between 29th and 30th Streets, in the increasingly popular NoMad neighborhood (where the Ace and NoMad hotels have already put down stakes).
Related: Virgin’s First Hotel Got Rid of Everything We Hate About Hotels
The renderings make it look kind of like a cross between an office building and an H&M, but we don’t care. When the company opened its first-ever Virgin Hotel in Chicago this past January, it got rid of everything we hated about hotels: it priced all the goodies in the minibar at regular street value (Peanut M&Ms for $1! Bottle of red wine for $24!), offered free and open Wi-Fi to everyone, placed outlets just about everywhere, installed smart TVs, and provided a Tesla to chauffeur guests anywhere within a two-mile radius.
We expect the same game-changing experience and design in the Manhattan outpost — and it looks like it’s already off to a typically intriguing Virgin-style start. The groundbreaking ceremony included the burial of a time capsule containing mementoes from the company’s NYC history: a CD from the old Virgin megastore in Times Square, a historic photo, a JFK boarding pass to a Virgin America flight, and of course Virgin Hotel key cards.
The glass cantilevered building will rise 39 stories in Manhattan’s NoMad neighborhood. (Image: Virgin Hotels)
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