Staying grounded
Patricia Best, October 25, 2007 at 7:08 AM EDT
globeandmail.com
Next Tuesday was supposed to be Toronto's perhaps first "ground awakening." But alas, it is not to be. Starwood Hotels & Resorts was planning to launch the construction of a new hotel with the event. The hotel group is bringing to Canada two new brands - aloft and element. Neither has a capital letter in its name. The first Canadian aloft hotel - one of the first Starwood is building in the world - is under construction near the Montreal airport. The aloft brand operates under Starwood's metro-hip W Hotel group. The element hotel in Toronto is an extended-stay hotel aimed at the business traveller and will be the first outside the United States. Starwood spokeswoman Cynthia Bond says the developers of the hotel decided that spring would be a more appropriate time for a ground awakening.
"We're awakening the city of Toronto with a new hotel brand, we're not breaking anything," she explains.