Intercontinental Hotels Group (IHG) has announced the signing of a Holiday Inn hotel in Australia’s Ballarat in a new partnership with hotel owners, Forte Group.
IHG states that Holiday Inn & Suites Ballarat Goldfields will be one of the most striking hotels in regional Australia and a coveted MICE destination, boasting a highly visible location from the Western Freeway which links Ballarat to Melbourne CBD.
The hotel will be designed by international, award-winning Hachem Architecture and will consist of 110 guest rooms and suites. It is expected to open in 2024 and according to IHG, the hotel will be one of the region’s premier business, leisure and MICE destinations, with 400 square meter of flexible meeting space including a large ballroom with stunning rural views, as well as an intimately designed 90-seat restaurant and bar, a day spa, gymnasium and outdoor swimming pool.
IHG’s Holiday Inn brand has undergone a global transformation over the last 18-months and its next-generation design includes innovative open lobbies, amazing F&B and suite offerings, making leisure and business travellers take note and is fast becoming a brand of choice.
For the uninitiated, Ballarat has a fast-growing technology sector and a number of major financial institutions have their base in the centre of the city, meaning the town is often abuzz with a regular flow of interstate corporate visitors during the week and leisure guests over the weekend.
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Abhijay Sandilya, Vice President of Development for Japan, Australasia and Japan, IHG, said:
Holiday Inn has made its mark as one of Australasia’s fasted growing hotel brands, and we are thrilled to be adding this state-of-the-art designed property to the Holiday Inn family. What’s particularly exciting about this property is that it will truly be a destination in its own right, with a range of facilities and amenities, including a spa, pool, conference centre, restaurant, bar, that will give it a resort-like feel. This will help drive mid-week occupancy particularly from corporate and business travellers, and it will also be a popular destination for weddings. Plus, we know that locals and regional holiday seekers are without a doubt going to be enamoured with the hotel and we can’t wait for construction to start and doors to open. We have been steadily growing IHG’s presence in regional Victoria and Holiday Inn & Suites Ballarat Goldfields will complement Holiday Inn & Suites Werribee, which opens this month, along with Holiday Inns in other great locations like Geelong, Richmond, Ringwood, Wagga Wagga and Melbourne’s Bourke Street Mall.
Often referred to as the gateway to regional tourism in the Central Highlands and Goldfield region, Ballarat is also home to a number of iconic cultural and heritage assets of its own, such as Sovereign Hill, Her Majesty’s Theatre, which is Australia’s oldest continuously operating purpose-built theatre, the Museum of Australian Democracy at Eureka and the Art Gallery of Ballarat to name a few.
William Tan from Forte Group (which will own the hotel), said:
We are very proud to be working with IHG Hotels & Resorts to bring our vision for this property to life. The hotel’s location, just out of the centre of Ballarat, will be highly accessible which will provide leisure guests convenience to central Ballarat and further afield. Ballarat is one of Australia’s fastest growing regional cities and the third largest city in Victoria. With strength of IHG Hotels & Resorts network, loyalty and distribution systems we are excited to be bringing travellers a premium, design-led hotel in one of the country’s most iconic locations.
Holiday Inn & Suites Ballarat Goldfields will join the 41 open or pipeline Holiday Inn brand family hotels in Australasia & Pacific.
Meanwhile, IHG recently announced the signing of the first-voco hotel in South Korea, Atwell Suites Austin Airport, four Indigo-branded hotels in Egypt, Holiday Inn Resort Szklarska Poreba, dual branded voco and Holiday Inn hotel in Chicago, voco The Palm in Dubai, Intercontinental Riyadh King Fahed Road, Intercontinental Resort Amma, Canj – Montenegro, three hotels in Bangkok and Pattaya and Holiday Inn Express and Suites Jalandhar. IHG’s voco-brand has also opened its first hotel in Netherlands. The company has opened its first Intercontinental-branded hotel in Baku, Azerbaijan, Australia’s first next-generation Holiday Inn in Melbourne’s West and Holiday Inn Dublin Airport.
Featured image by IHG
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