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Adelphi’s plans: Boutique gastronomy

The team behind the Adelphi Hotel in Saratoga Springs, New York, want to make  history of their own.

Adelphi Hospitality Group, backed by the firepower of hospitality real estate investors and developers Richbell Capital and Blue Skies Forever, are giving the 1877 grande dame a lovingly laborious facelift that will restore its former glory and then some, but they aren’t stopping there. “If you look at the team we’ve been able to assemble,” says Richbell President Toby Mildé, “this team of top-notch talent wouldn’t be assembled for just one project.”

The lobby of the Adelphi Hotel in Saratoga Springs, New York
The lobby of the Adelphi Hotel in Saratoga Springs, New York

That includes luxury hospitality veteran Michel Ducamp as chief operations officer and respected chef and restaurateur Gray Kunz as partner.

What Mildé calls the “surgical mending” of the Adelphi is taking private investment and federal and state tax credits totaling US$35 million to add steel framing, use hydraulics to lift sagging floors and preserve details down to the spindles on the grand staircase.

Thirty-two rooms, plus the courtyard, will complete phase one in time to reopen in May 2017. Phase two will take a year and add a ballroom for 250 people, an 8,000-square-foot spa, a swimming pool and 30 rooms.

On equal footing will be F&B: Brasserie Kunz, a lounge with a full menu focusing on raw seafood, and the Blue Hen. AHG has shown its hand with Salt & Char, a well-received steakhouse that opened next door to the Adelphi in July.

“We’ve focused very carefully on not only farm to market but supporting our local farmers,” Ducamp says. “Everything is locally sourced and locally produced.”

AHG is fine with growing organically, too. It’s backed by “real estate guys,” using Mildé’s shorthand, who will invest in properties opportunistically and to complement their portfolio. They’re looking in Boston, Miami, New York City. “The Adelphi will define us in luxury and F&B, but it won’t define us as far as location and the types of hotels that our company will purchase and create,” Mildé says.

“We want to compete in terms of the attention to detail and sense of arrival and wonderful community feel that you would see in a boutique hotel,” Ducamp adds. “You don’t have a feeling that it’s arrogant or pompous or distant. We want to engage our local producers and vendors and our guests to feel like we are part of their community.”

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