New Hotels Provide Enticing New Options in Puerto Rico

The tourism industry is booming in Puerto Rico, with air arrivals for the first quarter of 2023 an impressive 21 percent higher than a year ago, according to Discover Puerto Rico. So it’s no surprise that the destination’s hospitality industry is in growth mode, too, as new hotels debut and existing properties reveal major renovations.

Some of the destination’s biggest development news comes from Hilton, which plans to double its presence in Puerto Rico by 2025. The company is introducing 10 new hotels representing five different brands in San Juan, Ponce and Dorado, amounting to Hilton’s largest growth market in the Caribbean by number of hotels.

This new investment includes the first appearance in Puerto Rico of five Hilton brands, including the island’s first Curio Collection by Hilton, Tapestry Collection by Hilton, Hilton Garden Inn, Tru by Hilton and Homewood Suites by Hilton.

Among the first brand debuts to open is the Condado Palm Inn San Juan, Tapestry Collection by Hilton, which debuts in June 2023 as a rebranding of the former Best Western Plus Condado Palm Inn. The 186-room property, centrally located in the popular Condado neighborhood, has two restaurants, two pools and a dedicated beach attendant at nearby Condado Beach, which is just a block away.

Still to come is a massive reimagining of the existing Hilton Condado Plaza, which currently operates within two buildings connected by a skybridge. The north building, on the Atlantic coast side, is an architecturally significant structure that opened in 1963 and was designed by Morris Lapidus, an architect who made his mark with mid-century landmarks like the Fontainebleau Hotel and Eden Roc in Miami Beach. Hilton’s new strategy is to return the two buildings, which originally operated as separate properties in the 1960s, to their original, two-hotel concept, thus creating a dual-branded complex to appeal to a wider array of travelers.

Both structures will receive extensive updates and renovations before reopening in 2025. The Lapidus-designed building will relaunch as the 332-room San Juan Condado Plaza, Curio Collection by Hilton, while the building across the street, which looks out on the Condado Lagoon and first opened in the late 1960s as the Flamboyan Hotel and Casino, will open its doors as the 240-room Hilton Garden Inn San Juan Condado.