The Renaissance Westchester Hotel at 80 West Red Oak Lane in West Harrison, which had announced a temporary closing during the Covid-19 outbreak, will be closing permanently, according to a notice the hotel filed with the New York State Department of Labor.
Recently, the hotel”™s parking lots were empty and no lights or signs of activity could be seen. In addition to the main hotel, the property has “The Mansion,” which dates from 1905. The 30-room Normandy-style mansion was the centerpiece of the country estate of architect John Merven Carrere.
Although the hotel”™s pages on the website of Marriott International were still active and provided full details and photos of the hotel”™s facilities, when attempts were made to book rooms for future occupancy a message appeared stating “there are no rooms available at this property for the dates you selected.”
Phone calls to the hotel”™s local numbers failed to connect with any on-site personnel.
The Business Journal could not immediately determine whether a sale would be to an entity that would reopen the property as a hotel or an entity wishing to redevelop the approximately 30-acre parcel.
The company indicated in its notice to New York state that the permanent closing would take place soon, but did not provide a specific date. It did say that the nine employees who have remained on the hotel”™s payroll would be let go by about Nov. 15.
The Renaissance Westchester had undergone a six-month renovation in 2013 at a cost of $13 million. At that time, Marriott International said that guests will notice the new look of the hotel from the moment they stepped through the doors.
In an announcement at the time, Marriott described a new open lobby design “to make socializing, working and eating easy,” a new restaurant and bar and a new ballroom and meeting space. The hotel, originally completed in January 1978, is shown in a convention guide as having 347 guest rooms and event space of more than 20,000 square feet.
Before becoming a Renaissance hotel, the property was a Stouffer”™s Inn. On Dec. 4, 1980, a fire broke out in the third-floor meeting room portion of the hotel. Corporate breakfast meetings were underway at the time. Twenty-six people died, including employees of Arrow Electronics of Greenwich, Connecticut, and Nestle, which owned the Stouffer Corp. The fire did not spread to the room area of the hotel. A busboy was convicted of arson and murder but the conviction was reversed on appeal and the busboy was freed.
Stouffer split into food and hotel companies. In 1996, Nestle sold the Stouffer Hotel Co. to Renaissance Hotels and Resorts. In March 1997, Marriott International announced it had completed its $1 billion acquisition of Renaissance.
