Landmark hotel begins a makeover

Stamford Plaza staff started renovations by rearranging foyer furniture. Picture / Brett Phibbs

The landmark five-star Stamford Plaza will be closed for four months as it gets a total makeover, including 10 storeys of apartments on top of the existing 11 floors.

Although the top-end hotel doesn't close until midnight on May 31, the wind-down is already evident: lower-than-usual drinks prices aim to run down stocks before builders move in.

Yesterday, marketing director Lynda King and her staff got into the spirit of things, donning plastic hard hats and rearranging foyer furniture.

Through the foyer in the past 21 years have passed household names like the Queen, Bill Clinton when he was US President, a younger incarnation of the Rolling Stones, the Sultan of Brunei, the King of Tonga, and Big Bird from Sesame Street.

Actor Russell Crowe stayed, but no phones were thrown. Paul Holmes got married by the pool.

The hotel's Singapore-based owners, Stamford Land Corporation, are ploughing many millions into the work. The foyer will house two new restaurants and much American walnut, costing $4 million alone.

The apartment levels will contain 143 flats, ranging from one-bedroom units to a 720sq m penthouse. That work will finish in the middle of next year.

Ms King says that in the hotel trade, this is what is known as a "hard refurbishment" - disruptive enough to make closure the most practical option. (Soft refurbishments are about curtains, duvets and the like, with a hotel remaining partially open.)

Ms King says the 180 permanent jobs at the hotel are secure. Many will work as usual, as others undergo training, do planning or take leave.

The hotel cost $70 million to build in 1985, and, as the Regent, opened in May that year. Rooms cost $165 to $1000 - worth $356 to $2159 today.