UPDATE: 8-23-2019 — The Historic and Design Review Commission postponed a decision on this C-of-A application to its September meeting. Paul Kahlich, the architect with MCS Inc. responded to all of the planning staff’s objections and agreed to revise the design accordingly. However, he submitted the revisions the day of the meeting and staff was seeing them for the first time during public hearing. To give staff more time to review, the HDRC voted to come back to this the following month.
Originally Posted: 8-19-2019
by Adolfo Pesquera
San Antonio (Bexar County) — The development team for a hotel project near St. Paul Square is requesting a Certificate of Appropriateness for an 87-room, four-story hotel.
The Historic and Design Review Commission will consider the application at the Wednesday Aug. 21 session.
The hotel will carry the Candlewood Suites brand of IHG (InterContinental Hotels Group). It will be located on a vacant lot in the middle of a city block that is between North Cherry Street and the railroad tracks.
Ground retail space with 1,325 square feet has been proposed that will face East Commerce. The building will include a parking garage sufficient for 60 vehicles in the form of a double level parking structure serving as a podium below three floors of hotel rooms.
The Design Review Committee met with the architect on Aug. 13 and raised concerns about several architectural details. The windows on the building have shutters and the committee wanted them removed. There were also criticisms about the parking garage facade and the enclosed courtyard at street level.
Paul Kahlich of Mitchell Carlson Stone Inc. LLC in Houston is representing the owner. Kahlich noted in his narrative that the retail floor finish will be 33 inches lower than the hotel first floor to accommodate street access.
He proposed for automobile parking to be wrapped with access into the structure at the center of the lot. City staff said the location is appropriate, but that the architect should continue to incorporate architectural elements that separate the façade so that it does not read as a one single plane.
The landscape plan complies with the Downtown Design Guide and will include street-side trees.
Another conflict was the ground floor height. The design has a different height for the retail component. City staff insisted on a ground floor height of at least 14 feet for the entire structure.
There is a historic commercial building, 1203 E. Commerce St., that is adjacent to the project site that is affecting design. Staff recommends the new building fenestration, facade separation and architectural elements should be comparable to those found on the historic building “to continue the architectural rhythm found on the block.
“Additionally, staff finds that the proposed tile should be increased to the full sixteen foot height of the base on the southern façade and at the entrance on the western façade.”
EIFS panels and porcelain stone facade tiles are being proposed. The Downtown Design Guide prohibits the use of EIFS but a recent change in state law limiting what cities can do about materials that meet national building code standards may have an effect.
Staff added that if EIFS are used, they should be sized and textured to resemble stucco, adding that no EIFS or stucco should be used on the ground floor.
The owner of record is Kennedy Hotel LP of Corpus Christi. This appears to be a special purpose entity created by RGB Hospitality.
According the state architectural barrier records, the project has an estimated cost of $4.5 million.
Mitchell Carlson Stone is also in the process of completing designs on a Home2 Suites and Tru dual brand Hilton hotel in Galveston. That is a $6 million, five-story, 196-room hotel at 4302 Seawall Boulevard that is supposed to start construction in October.
adolfo@virtualbx.com
