Rocker Lenny Kravitz joins famed hotel designer Philippe Starck to develop a vision for the much-awaited SLS hotel in Miami’s South Beach at 17th and Collins Avenue.
SLS is the brainchild of Sam Nazarian, who started as a Los Angeles nightclub operator but with his company “sbe” has been shaking up L.A.’s restaurant and hotel scene.
The Miami location will mark the second SLS when it opens next March, following the SLS hotel that opened during the recession at the L.A.-Beverly Hills border. Nazarian plans to open a third at some point in Las Vegas on the site of the just-shuttered Sahara.
Kravitz’s seven-year-old firm Kravitz Design Inc. is tasked with creating an exclusive bungalow and penthouse suite, which could be a hit with the sports teams and athletes, celebrities and others who consider South Beach their playground.
The SLS South Beach will likely go head to head with the W South Beach for some individual customers, since it’s a much smaller hotel. At the W South Beach, the smallest of its 408 black-and-white-themed rooms can go for $800 a night during peak winter season.
Another sign that the SLS will target the W crowd: A couple of months ago, sbe plucked W South Beach GM (general manager) Albert Mertz to run the SLS South Beach. Mertz had joined the W after running the Raleigh Hotel, which was part of Andre Balazs’ luxury hotel group, and also had experience working with the luxury Mandarin Oriental and Ritz-Carlton chains.
