Mt. Lavinia’s grand ole lady gets luxury makeover
Sri Lanka’s iconic Mt. Lavinia Hotel besotted with a fairy tale of love, of a Governor and a fair maiden, will become the next grandeur of luxury as it readies for major renovation plans scheduled for 2020.
Mount Lavinia Hotel.
The present Mt. Lavinia Hotel is tipped to commence major renovations scheduled for the summer of next year starting May at a cost of about US$25 million (nearly Rs. 4.5 billion), the hotel’s Chairman Sanath Ukwatte told the Business Times on Wednesday.
One of the key aspects of going forward would be the upgrading of the hotel to a five star property with a luxury branding catering to a niche clientele and redesigning its brand name from the existing to the “Mt. Lavinia Grand Hotel.”
Mr. Ukwatte explained that the rebranding of the hotel name itself was required since the hotel is considered to be one with a history and location and only a few of them were found in this region.
The renovations would take place wing by wing in a bid to not disrupt the running of the hotel, he explained.
Work is expected to commence with the original building and later shift to the public areas with restaurants and the back of the house.
At present there are currently two restaurants in operation at the hotel and with the renovations carried out the hotel would be opening up its dining experience to new concepts, Mr. Ukwatte said.
In this respect, the hotel has had discussions with international brands to ensure that some unique concepts could be worked out and the hotel would eventually also increase its restaurants to four.
The capacity on average would be about 50-60 people and these would be specialty restaurants, it was noted.
In addition, other plans at the hotel would include the conversion of a few more rooms into suites due to the increasing demand for suite space by the Mt. Lavinia Hotel patrons as opposed to rooms, Mr. Ukwatte said.
The loyal regular clientele on average would stay from a period of a few weeks to months at the hotel, he explained.
In this respect, they hope to create more space to cater to the growing demand for suites and where there are currently 10 the number would increase to 36. “We are more interested in quality than quantity,” he said.
Mr. Ukwatte pointed out that they were looking at establishing an integrated hotel as well with expansion plans in the horizon for a MICE centre, with a theatre for 600 persons and a reception hall catering to 2000, and 20-floor apartment space, on about three acres of adjoining land available to the hotel.
The residencies would comprise 180 apartments on over 20 floors with a five storey car park available; he said adding that it would be unique in the fact that it would be having direct beach access.
Mr. Ukwatte also stated that the hotel would be offering a unique dining experience in the restored tunnel used by the lovers by opening up the tunnel more.
The over 210-year old Mt. Lavinia Hotel holds the history to the unique age old love story of Governor Sir Thomas Maitland and the local damsel Lavinia.