Mandarin Oriental to open new Honolulu hotel

Hong Kong-based Mandarian Oriental Hotel Group is coming back to Hawaii as part of a partnership with Salem Partners, a Los Angeles-based investment bank and wealth management firm. The two companies will open a 36-story mixed-use tower across from Honolulu's Hawaii Convention Center in early 2020. 

The 232-unit Manaolana Place project will include 125 hotel rooms and 107 residences. The 400-foot-high mixed-use project will be located near a new rail transit station in Honolulu.

When it opens, this hotel will be the first hotel under the Mandarin Oriental brand in Hawaii since 2006, when The Kahala Hotel & Resort was rebranded as an independent property.

Colorado-based architecture firm [au]workshop, Honolulu’s AHL ( formerly known as Architects Hawaii), Dianna Wong Architects + Interior Design and Hart Howerton Landscape Architects are all rumored to be involved in the project, which is slated to begin construction this year.

The same developer is also planning to develop a parcel occupied by the Heald College Building next to Walgreens’ flagship Hawaii store in Honolulu into another high-rise condominium-hotel tower.