total event space of more than 750,000 square feet , which , for perspective , is around 13 football fields or 160 basketball courts . That ’ s a lot of Hail Mary passes and half-court shots . ( Navigating a Gaylord property is , understandably , not easy . At the beginning of this year , Gaylord introduced a wayfinding app that offers step-bystep directions to rooms , meeting areas , restrooms , fitness center , pools and other areas of the hotel .)
A rendering of the Gaylord Pacific Resort & Convention Center , slated to open in 2025 .
Capacious is a good if not a completely representative way to describe a Gaylord hotel . There are five of them currently operating across the U . S ., one in Nashville ( Gaylord Opryland ), one just on the perimeter of Washington , D . C . ( Gaylord National ), one in the Dallas / Ft . Worth area ( Gaylord Texan ), one just south of Orlando ( Gaylord Palms ) and one just east of Denver ( Gaylord Rockies ). One will open in Chula Vista ( Gaylord Pacific ), seven miles from downtown San Diego , in 2025 .
These are spacious hotels , convention hotels , ones that host association events , like the Conservative Political Action Conference , better known as CPAC , which was held at Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in March of this year . Other events that have been held at Gaylord National include the annual Scripps National Spelling Bee , staged there since 2011 , and MLB ’ s Winter Meetings .
Consider Gaylord Opryland Resort & Convention Center . Beyond its almost 3,000 guestrooms , it has 86 event rooms with
OPPORTUNITY KNOCKS It ’ s a lot of space to fill and the COVID-19 pandemic did it no service , but it also presented opportunity . Looking after these five properties with one on the way is John Adams , who , while sharing a name with a Founding Father , is VP and managing director of Gaylord Hotels at Marriott International , which acquired the brand and management contracts in 2012 for roughly $ 210 million in cash . The five properties are owned by Ryman Hospitality Properties , a real estate investment trust based in Nashville . ( Gaylord Pacific is being developed and owned by Houston-based RIDA Development Corporation .)
“ The pandemic presented an opportunity for us as much as it was a tremendous challenge ,” said Adams , who at one point in his career was GM of the Opryland property . “ We saw the opportunity to dive in headfirst on some things that were planned , but not yet executed relative to expansion .”
By the second quarter of 2020 , four of five Gaylord properties were completely shut down , but it gave Marriott and Ryman the opportunity to execute renovations and other CapEx expenditures . They pressed forward completing a $ 158-million expansion of Gaylord Palms , adding 302 new guestrooms and 96,000 square feet of new meeting space to complement the existing 400,000-squarefoot convention center .
It wasn ’ t all just business ; introduced was the Crystal River Rapids water attraction , part of the Cypress Springs Water Park . “ It brought added incentive for group and leisure guests to the hotel during what was a very difficult time ,” Adams said . ( The Gaylord brand ’ s assortment of outdoor water experiences allowed them to reopen hotels to leisure guests fairly quickly amid the pandemic . “ If you think back to the onset of the pandemic and the first summer , people were ready to get outside and have some fun ,” Adams said .)
Up north , outside D . C ., Gaylord National pressed on with a $ 64-million redesign of all 1.996 guestrooms , which now sport a new look more respective of the capital region , Adams said . This is in addition to a major exterior enhancement done to Gaylord Rockies .
Work performed on these hotels is the amuse-gueule to what will be the 2025 opening of Gaylord Pacific , in Chula Vista , Calif ., a $ 1.3-billion project that Adams said is around 30 % complete and called a “ game-changer .” One distinction it will have from its sibling
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