Construction close to starting on burned Fairfield Inn

The owners of the heavily fire-damaged Palm Desert Fairfield Inn hope to start construction soon on a complete redesign with the hotel to be re-branded as a Marriott Springhill.

It was the morning after Stagecoach last year. A spark from an air conditioning unit quickly turned into a raging inferno, one that we’ve learned is the end of the Fairfield Inn. It will be re-branded as a Marriott Springhill.

“It’s going to be a better-looking building. It’s going to bring it up to a (more) standard modern look than the original Fairfield,” said Palm Desert City Supervising Plans Examiner Jason Finley.

The fire and the water used to douse the flames caused more than $4 million damage to the Marriott Fairfield Inn. Instead of just making repairs, the owners, Kalthia Group Hotels, plan to redesign the decades-old hotel.

“It’s going to be more contemporary than its predecessor was.” The architecture is newer and fresher and uses, we call it contemporary desert architecture, with some nature stone on the outside,” said Palm Desert Director of Community Development Lauri Aylaian.

The existing building won’t be torn down since 40 percent of the structure is still usable. The $9.5 million project will expand the lobby, update the pool area and modernize the rooms.

“Typically we’d like to see a quicker response from projects to get them back up to operational status, but unfortunately, I believe the brand-changing delayed this process,” said Finley.

“It is a process that takes time, especially if you want to make it new and different,” said Aylaian.

News Channel 3 and CBS Local 2 has learned the architectural plans are now in the process of getting approved by the city of Palm Desert.

“The whole point of doing that is to make sure the public and the property owners get a safe compliant project. A commercial project of this size, we are concerned about life health and safety, accessibility and the general aesthetics of what the city wants a project like this to look like,” said Finley.

Once the final design is green-lighted, Kalthia Group Hotels says it’s ready to start construction on what’s expected to be an eight-month project. The goal is to be open by early next year.

“It’s basically in their hands at this point and we are just waiting for a response from their design professionals,” said Finley.

Kalthia Group Hotels says employees who worked at the hotel before the fire will be the first new hires for Springhill Suites.