The Downtown Development Review Board awarded conceptual design approval to the historic Laura Street Trio renovation.
The board voted 8-0 during its Feb. 11 meeting to advance developer SouthEast Development Group LLC’s estimated $70.4 million plan to convert the three vacant urban core structures into a 146-room hotel with restaurant and retail spaces.
Board member Matt Brockelman with The Southern Group is a lobbyist for SouthEast. He recused himself from the vote.
The project will return to the board for final approval before work can begin.
During his presentation, project architect Tom Hurst of Dasher Hurst Architects said the eight-story addition to the historic Trio was needed to bring the proposed hotel to 146 rooms and be financially viable.
Hurst said the design team and SouthEast Managing Director Steve Atkins want the layout to emphasize the three historic structures — the Florida Life, Bisbee and Marble Bank buildings — that comprise the Trio at 51 W. Forsyth St.
“We want to make sure that we’re deferential to the existing historic buildings and we don’t try to overwhelm them,” Hurst said. “We could have probably designed a 20-story high-rise here and we could have made the numbers work better. But we want to pay homage to them.”
Floor plans show a 4,021-square-foot retail space in the hotel addition and a 4,253-square-foot retail shell in the Bisbee Building which Atkins and Hurst said will be a bodega grocery store. Both are on the ground floor.
The proposed restaurant in the Marble Bank Building is 5,764 square feet.
Hurst said Feb. 11 it will be a steak and seafood house run by hotel operator Winegardner & Hammons Hotel Group LLC.
The restaurant will be open to nonhotel guests, according to SouthEast.
Plans include a 3,350-square-foot rooftop bar and restaurant on the hotel’s eighth floor.
Hurst said the architectural team wanted the hotel addition to be “clean and modern” but coordinate with the historic structures through material patterns and tones.
“I think it’s really beautiful,” board Chair Trevor Lee said.
“Seeing all the retail on the ground floor, the sensitivity to the architecture, the sensitivity to the historic nature of all three buildings set the bar really high for DDRB applications. I wish we saw this kind of quality every single time someone submitted,” he said.
SouthEast plans an outdoor piazza with shade trees, outdoor seating and public art and a vehicle drop-off zone on the Adams Street side of the development.
According to the board report, the ground-floor retail space will have multiples entrances on Laura Street and all three buildings will maintain their historic entry points.
Parking will be offered at VyStar Credit Union’s proposed garage at the corner of Laura and Forsyth streets, Hurt said.
The Trio buildings, built between 1902 and 1912, are historic and contributing structures to the Downtown Jacksonville National Register District, according to a presentation provided by SouthEast.
Atkins is working with Marriott Hotels International Inc. to brand the Trio as one of the company’s Autograph Collection of hotels.
Atkins has pursued the Laura Street Trio’s restoration for nearly 11 years. Before the presentation, he noted the first letter he wrote to a bank to acquire the buildings was sent in November 2009.
“Mr. Atkins, you truly have slain Goliath on this project,” board member J. Brent Allen said.
“I wish a lot of developers in this city would be as persistent as you were. As a lifelong resident of Jacksonville, I really hope you throw your name in on a couple of other projects we have around town as well.”
