Keystone Group is going bigger in Carmel, scooping up the Renaissance Indianapolis North Hotel and lining up a multi-phase renovation that aims to turn the property into the anchor of a walkable hotel hub along the Meridian corridor. The company says it will modernize guest rooms and the lobby, expand and update meeting and event spaces, and grow the room count by six while refreshing street-level dining.
In a company release reported by FOX59, Keystone said it will add six suites, boosting the hotel’s total from 266 to 272 rooms. The renovation plan also calls for “an entirely new street-level restaurant concept and a new café.” The same release notes that Keystone has picked up a large parcel of nearby land and is studying a master plan that could ultimately total roughly 400 rooms. “This acquisition is about more than adding another hotel to Keystone Hospitality’s portfolio,” Keystone founder Ersal Ozdemir said in the release, according to the report.
What Will Change at the Renaissance
Marriott’s property page lists the Renaissance as a full-service hotel with 266 guest rooms and roughly 12,000 square feet of meeting and event space, and notes that the property already hosts conventions and group business. Marriott also describes the hotel as operating on a lifestyle model that blends food-and-beverage outlets with meeting inventory, the very components Keystone says it plans to expand in the renovation.
Part of a Bigger Strategy
The Carmel deal is the latest in a run of hospitality plays for Keystone in central Indiana. In May, the company bought the Sheraton Indianapolis City Centre and outlined plans to convert that downtown property into the second Renaissance-branded hotel in the state, according to ConnectCRE. The company has also talked about weaving its neighboring downtown holdings into an interconnected district around Monument Circle.
Carmel Mayor Sue Finkam has signaled that Keystone’s approach fits with local goals to trade surface parking for denser, walkable mixed-use districts, according to the same company release reported by FOX59.
Keystone has not yet put a firm timeline or price tag on the Carmel renovation. Earlier coverage of the Sheraton-to-Renaissance conversion put that downtown project on roughly a two-year schedule while keeping the hotel operating, WIBC reported. Local business and development watchers say that additional room inventory and upgraded meeting space in Hamilton County could help the region land larger conventions and more weekend visitors, supporting restaurants, retailers and event vendors in the short and medium term, a pattern consistent with Keystone’s recent investments highlighted by the Indianapolis Business Journal.
