Marriott To Launch Boutique Brand

BETHESDA, Md. (Blue MauMau) - Marriott International Inc. is partnering with destination innovator Ian Schrager to create a presence in the fast growing boutique hotel market that until now it has been slow to enter. Its plan is to create some 100 boutique hotels in major cities throughout the world. Such lodgings are smaller but offer plush designs and more services than standard hotels.

Schrager is attributed to having invented the concept of small, stylish and upscale boutique hotels some 23 years ago with Morgans Hotel in New York. He has a colorful past. He co-owned the Studio 54, a New York nightclub, and then later served time in prison for tax evasion.

Says Mr. Schrager about what he will design, "[Boutique guests] expect and deserve impeccable, modern and gracious personalized service that is at the same time luxurious yet down to earth. It is the ultimate balancing act of these apparent contradictions to create a hotel that is simultaneously specific and customized yet universal. We intend to make this type of lodging widely accessible and available for the first time in the key lodging destinations across the globe and to everybody around the world who wants it.”

“The scale of this brand requires the reach, resources and expertise of a global player like Marriott, while the innovation necessary calls for the experience and originality of the category’s most accomplished entrepreneur, Ian Schrager,” said J.W. Marriott, Jr., chairman and CEO of Marriott International.

Related readings:

• The Wall Street Journal, Strange Bedfellows: Marriott, Schrager