Many Rooms with a View

Gossips has been following the progress of The Wick Hotel ever since December 2015, when Tom Rossi and John Blackburn first appeared before the Planning Board to discuss their plans for transforming 41 Cross Street into a 55-room boutique hotel. This morning, eighteen months later, the Redburn Development executive team invited state and local officials and the media to what they called a "groundbreaking" for the hotel which is expected to open in the fall.

Guests assembled in what was once the lobby and gallery of Stageworks, where renderings of what would be the hotel's common areas--the lobby and the glass enclosed rooftop deck--were on display.

Remarks were made by several of the officials at the gathering, congratulating the project, celebrating its progress, and calling it an exciting moment for Hudson. A representative of Starwood Hotels & Resorts announced that The Wick was to be part of its Tribute Portfolio, which now includes nineteen independent hotels, described as "incredible hotels in exciting locations." The most comprehensive comments were made by Mike Tucker, president and CEO of Columbia Economic Development Corporation (CEDC), who called the $8.5 million project "the first significant investment in the redevelopment of the Hudson waterfront." He also noted that the project had received the largest award--a $1.5 million Empire State Development grant--from the Regional Council, was the first time the city and county IDAs had collaborated on a project, and would be the first "flag hotel" in Columbia County.

Speeches over, it was time for the groundbreaking, which turned out not to be a groundbreaking at all but a ceremonial "wall raising."

After the wall raisers posed for a photo op, folks donned hard hats and toured the framed out interior spaces of the rest of the building.

COPYRIGHT 2017 CAROLE OSTERINK