OPERATIONS
FINDING THE EDGE
AS CRESTLINE HITS A MILESTONE ANNIVERSARY, IT LOOKS FORWARD TO THE NEXT CHAPTER.
By DAVID EISEN
James Carroll, the president and CEO of Crestline Hotels & Resorts, is quick to remind visitors to his Fairfax, Va., office that the model planes on his bookshelf are not toys, but replicas. It’ s a fine distinction and one the former naval aviator takes seriously, having flown F / A-18 Hornets in his time after graduating from the U. S. Naval Academy. Among the replicas are red-and-white banded models, training planes, as Carroll points out, that sit beside the F18s Carroll and his fellow flyboys graduated to. Running hotels is not dogfighting, but the symbolism isn’ t lost: Crestline is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year and, having shed its training wings long ago, is jetting forward on a mission to be at the top of all third-party management companies in the U. S.
It starts at the top— and that’ s Carroll, who joined Crestline in 2004 and was promoted to president and CEO six years later. Crestline, in a roundabout way, is a spawn of Marriott. In the early 1990s,
Marriott spun off its owned real estate, creating an OpCo and PropCo bifurcation, with
The rooftop of The Delphi Host Marriott in downtown Los Angeles.
retaining Marriott’ s The hotel, previously The Standard, was added to lodging real
Crestline’ s portfolio in 2023. estate and other concessions business, while Marriott International took over management duties. One of the people who worked on the split was Bruce Wardinski, who, after Host reclassified as a REIT, helped spin off and lead Crestline Capital, which took with it Host’ s nonessential real estate holdings. Around 2000, Crestline reshuffled its asset mix and started reinvesting in hotels, with Wardinski also deciding to manage them. Crestline Hotels & Resorts was born. In 2002, Spain’ s Barcelo Hotels & Resorts acquired Crestline Capital, sold 60 % of it four years later before reacquiring it in 2017.
James Carroll joined Crestline Hotels & Resorts in 2004 and was appointed president and CEO in 2010.
44 hotelsmag. com Sept / Oct 2025