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Topping Out Party

Hotel Indigo reached another milestone on Friday, topping out at five floors. Over 200 people gathered to celebrate, including JM Wilkerson's construction crew and special guests from near and far. As the tradition holds, an evergreen tree was placed atop the completed structure to symbolize growth and bring luck. 

Together we feasted, we toured and we entertained. The celebration opened with UGA student Derrick Southerland's electric guitar performance of "The Star-Spangled Banner" and a roll-down of a large banner announcing that Hotel Indigo Athens is now taking reservations for Fall 2009. The grill was fired up, and the sun was shining brightly upon us.

Many of us climbed the five floors to check out construction and take in views of Athens from the rooftop. See our Topping Out Party album for pictures. Thank you to everyone who made this day possible.

Countdown to Topping Out

Just four more days until Hotel Indigo tops out. All five floors will be in place by the end of the week, and we plan to celebrate! Listen out for us from the rooftop this Friday.

Athens Green Life Expo

Hotel Indigo was proud to help sponsor Athens' first annual Green Life Expo on January 30-31 at The Classic Center. Over 2000 visitors attended the exhibit and seminars, which was a great testament to the locals' interest in green issues and sustainable design.

Denis Blackburne of Melaver, our joint developer, spoke about the Benefits of Building Green to an audience of local sustainable businesses on Friday. Our architectural model of Hotel Indigo was also on display throughout the two-day show. We greeted hundreds of visitors at our booth and awarded a complimentary hotel night's stay to the winner of our drawing--Ms. Mae Walters of Athens, Georgia.

Model Room Milestone

This was a milestone week for the Hotel Indigo. We now have a full-scale mockup of a King size guestroom on site. 

The model room is essentially a mini-version of the hotel, architecturally detailed on both the interior and the exterior. From the outside, you can see how the cementitious siding, the large-scale windows, and the metal roof will appear. Each of these design elements are not only attractive, they were chosen to support our LEED Gold Certification. For example, the cement composite used for the siding is sustainable on multiple fronts--it enhances energy performance, it contains recycled materials, it's manufactured locally, and its durability will ensure a long-lasting building.

This is not your ordinary architectural mock-up--it is fully furnished and supplied with running water and electricity. Many are asking us if they can spend the night, and the answer is "sure, technically you could sleep, bathe and stay warm, but the room is really just for show." We will be inviting guests to tour the room and provide feedback before we build 130 more in the actual hotel. We think you will be pleased to experience a taste of what's to come.

Congratulations to everyone on the project team who made the model room possible. Special recognition to JM Wilkerson's Jerry Petty and Jason Pruitt for getting the job done, to Rialto's Anna George for staying on top of the details, to Mercury Art Works' Chris Wyrick for stepping in when help was needed, and to designer Ellen Hanson for making it beautiful.

Help this Tree Live on...

It is a necessary evil of construction that trees gets displaced. We had this beautiful, mature tree on the northwest corner of our site that obstructed our entry driveway. As much as we wanted to preserve it, the construction activity would have subjected the tree to a slow death. Instead we decided we needed to memorialize the tree in a new inert form. 

The whole trunk of the tree now lives off site, but we want to bring it back to its birth place at 500 College Avenue after construction is completed. Friends of the project have been kicking around different ideas, such as cutting the trunk in sections to create cylindrical stools, all of which are possible. We invite you to share ideas about how you might repurpose this tree by posting a comment or emailing rialtopp@gmail.com.

The Big Pour

You will notice from today's album that we can barely contain our excitement over the pouring of concrete. This marks the official completion of the foundation for the first level of the hotel. Stay tuned as the hotel's five stories come up over the course of the winter season.