Hotels underwent an expansionary phase in Cork city in 2024 - and there's more to come
The new €40m Moxy Hotel and Residence Inn on Camden Quay added more than 200 rooms to Cork city. Picture: Larry Cummins
IF 2023 was the year for flashy new student accommodation around Cork city, it was the turn of hotels to hog the limelight in the year gone by. Not only did a c €80m hotel building boom deliver 400 new rooms in the city, it also saw some big-name brands make their Leeside début. This time last year, Cork did not have a Premier Inn. This time next year, its owners hope construction of a second inn will be underway.
The global Marriott brand also landed in Cork city, delivering two very different offerings, co-located on Camden Quay: the 153-bed ‘playful’ Moxy Hotel and the 53-bed Residence Inn, designed for longer-term stays. Developed at the former location of Atkins/McKenzie’s garden world, later a circuit court, the two hotels, built by Limerick-based Conack Construction, cost €40m.
Up on the hills of the city, beyond St Lukes Cross, The Montenotte Hotel unveiled nine new woodland and riverside suites, built at an eye-popping cost of €7.5m.
It’s been a boom-y year for hotel construction, and there’s more in the pipeline for 2025. We’ll have scarcely rung in the New Year before work starts on a €15m 58-bed boutique hotel at No 71 South Mall, where hotelier Shay Livingstone (formerly of Rochestown Park Hotel) has pledged a product “the likes of which Cork has never seen”.
“The preparatory work is done, the conservation work is done with Cork City Council, there’s nothing to hold me back. I’m rearing to come off the blocks,” Mr Livingstone said.
The hotel is expected to take 14 months to complete. Formerly National Irish Bank, the original ground floor banking hall, designed in 1885 by architect William Caldbeck, will be retained, and a new block added to the rear.
Mr Livingstone won’t be the only one building if the Whitbread group, which owns the Premier Inn brand, gets planning permission for a second Premier Inn in Cork city at a 0.5 acre site at the junction of MacCurtain St and Brian Boru St, which they paid €5.5m for February. There’s a few hoops to jump through first: Cork City Council has expressed concerns that the proposed design does not fit in with the setting or character of the wider MacCurtain St area.
Whitbread will need to revisit the design but say they remain committed to building a 173-bed inn at the Leisureplex entertainment complex site. If the inn does go-ahead, it will bring the total Premier Inn bed-count in the city to 360.
“At this stage, we do not have plans for additional Premier Inn hotels in Cork beyond the two hotels mentioned, as they fulfil our current network requirement,” a spokesperson said.
The group’s hope is that they will start construction on inn No 2 in 2025 “aiming for completion and opening in 2027”. While the contractor for the project has not yet been appointed, the Cavan-based Elliot group delivered for Whitbread on Morrison’s Quay, where the €30m Premier Inn was a Greenleaf Group/Warren Private development. In building the inn, they also restored, at a cost of €15m, three dilapidated buildings that comprised the former Moore’s Hotel. The upshot is three handsome, own-door office blocks, bookended by the Premier Inn, giving a much-needed facelift to jaded Morrison’s Quay.
There is further uplift in store. The hotel will also benefit from works ongoing on Morrison’s Quay/Morrison’s Island, where, fresh off the Macroom bypass project, Jons Civil Engineering are engaged in flood defence and public realm works. The end-product will deliver a 3m-wide river promenade, an enhanced streetscape, and hopefully protect a quay, notorious for flooding, from future inundation.
Wider areas of the city will also benefit from public realm/streetscape upgrades under a €46m Cork City Council plan, with the focus on the South Main St/Grand Parade/Bishop Lucey Park nexus, where widespread pedestrianisation is underway.
The jumbo in the room is the continued absence of any visible progress on the Cork Events Centre. While the wider Brewery Quarter/South Main St area has seen the restoration of the old brewery buildings, including the fabulous former Beamish & Crawford Counting House, the adjoining site, where former Fine Gael Taoiseach Enda Kenny turned the sod on the event centre seven years ago, is essentially a storage yard for contractors.
The only building activity is on two new pedestrian bridges, across the south channel of the River Lee, linking the event centre site to the opposite quays. In the meantime, Cork City Council has to re-tender the event centre project because of legal fears that the level of state aid now required to get it over the line could breach EU procurement rules.
The precariousness of the entire project is unsettling for the local hotel industry. President of the Irish Hotels Federation (IHF) Michael Magner, said while they welcome the addition of new hotel stock to the city, “there needs to be a demand for it to be viable”.
“We need to have hooks to ensure people continue to visit the city and the event centre is key. It’s now seven years in and there is still no progress. The development of the event centre and of the docklands will all drive demand,” Mr Magner said.
He’s taken a cautious approach to expansion of his own c 70-bed hotel, the Vienna Woods in Glanmire. While they were given planning permission for 45 additional rooms, they’ve added 25 for now. Inflation and supply chain issues have played a part. “From December 1st the price we pay for coffee went up 14%. That’s the highest percentage increase ever,” Mr Magner said.
The owners of the Premier Inn are more sanguine about the stalled event centre plan.
“We certainly look closely at demand drivers for our hotels when we consider new site opportunities.
“But despite the delays delivering the [event centre] venue, the strength of Cork’s business and leisure economies, and the under-supply of branded hotel bedrooms in the city, make it a very attractive one for hotel businesses like us,” the spokesperson said.
The three-star Moxy Hotel/Residence Inn hotels on Camden Quay were developed by the JMK hospitality group, owned by the UK-based Kajani family, of which Irish-Pakistani businessman John Kajani is chair.
Roger Russell, general manager at the Moxy/Residence Inn, said they are excited about the continued growth of the hospitality sector in Cork.
“The city is expanding and there is a need for a diverse range of hotels to cater for all tastes, budgets and requirements.
“Looking ahead to 2025, our focus remains on providing vibrant, guest-centric experiences that appeal to both business and leisure travellers,” Mr Russell said.
JMK group also has planning permission (via Carra Shores Ltd) for a 103-bed three-star aparthotel at Nos 31,32 and 33 South Terrace. While there’s still two years to run on the permission, it’s unclear if the project will go ahead. Another hotel project whose future is unclear is the €150m 34-storey tower proposed by the Tower Holdings Group for Custom House quays. There’s been no activity on site since An Bord Pleanála gave the go ahead to the 240-bed hotel in March 2021. Permission expires in March 2026.
Generally though, hotels have been through an expansionary phase in Cork city in 2024. The hotel bed-count in the city stands at 2,425 (IHF figures), excluding the new stock. Shay Livingstone’s South Mall plans will boost that figure further, even if his boutique hotel isn’t due for delivery until 2026.
“It will be all systems go come January,” Mr Livingstone said.
