Detroit to Add Second Convention Hotel to Compete for Bigger Events
Photo Credit: Visit Detroit / Ryan Southen
Skift Take
With a second Huntington Place-connected hotel in the works, Detroit is looking to close a gap that has limited its ability to compete with other convention cities, a lack of hotel inventory.
Detroit is moving ahead with a 600-room convention-center hotel connected to Huntington Place via a skywalk. Plans were unveiled April 29 at Visit Detroit’s annual partner meeting.
The new hotel is expected to break ground early next year. It will join the 601-room JW Marriott Water Square, already under construction along the riverfront, and will also be linked to Huntington Place.
“This is another milestone moment for hotel development in Detroit and puts Huntington Place in a prime position to secure even more industry-leading meetings, conventions, and large-scale events,” said Claude Molinari, chairman of the board of the Detroit Regional Convention Facility Authority.
The JW is slated for a soft opening in December, with an official opening next April, before the 2027 NCAA Men’s Final Four.
Closing the Gap
The two projects are expected to expand Detroit’s room inventory and help attract larger conventions, according to the Detroit Regional Convention and Facility Authority.
Mike Ferreira, founder and CEO of Meetings Made Easy and CEO of Detroit Motor City DMC, said Detroit could become “the new Nashville” within a decade, an ambitious comparison.
The new hotels will help the city become more competitive, he said.
“For a client bringing a 3,000-person group to Detroit, we need 12 to 15 hotels at present,” he said. “Once these two new hotels open, we will need less than 10, a major selling point.”
A Broader Pipeline
The Huntington Place hotels are part of a broader hotel push to upgrade room supply and upgrade the city’s meetings infrastructure.
The Detroit EDITION, a 227-room luxury property inside the new Hudson’s Detroit Tower, adds both rooms and meeting space.
The Department at Hudson, a three-floor, 56,000-square-foot event venue that is already open and managed by Marriott, can host up to 2,000 attendees.
Meanwhile, NoMad Detroit is also set to open next year. Set in the historic Michigan Central train station, it will have 180 guest rooms.
New venues are also expanding off-site possibilities. Cosm Detroit, opening this fall in downtown, features an LED dome designed for immersive presentations, keynotes, and events.
A City Repositioning
With roughly 723,000 square feet of exhibit space, including one of the largest contiguous exhibit halls in the U.S., Huntington Place has long had the physical capacity to host major events. What it lacked was the adjacent room block to match.
Upcoming 2026 bookings include major gatherings such as the American Planning Association conference, the Society for Historical Archaeology conference, and Placemaking Week.
The momentum marks a stark contrast to 2013, when Detroit filed for bankruptcy. Today, the city is repositioning itself as a value-driven alternative to top-tier destinations.
“Think of everything a tier-one city offers, airport access, culture, sports, but with tier-two pricing,” Ferreira said. “The only weaknesses have been hotel inventory and perception. Both are changing fast.”
