Morrison Hotel in Dublin given permission to add 16 bedrooms at five-star property

Dublin City Council has granted planning permission to the owners of the five-star Morrison Hotel in Dublin for an extension that will bring the total number of hotel rooms to 161.

This follows the Council granting permission to Centauro Investments for the additional 16 hotel bedrooms.

Zetland Capital, a London-based private equity firm, bought the Morrison in 2021 for an undisclosed sum though it was reported at the time that the deal was worth more than €65 million. The boutique hotel on Dublin’s Ormond Quay Lower was owned by Russian billionaire investor Elena Baturina, who bought it from Nama in 2012 for €22 million.

In the extension plan, four of the new rooms are to be provided at basement level, while eight bedrooms are to be provided at ground floor in lieu of three meeting rooms. On the fourth floor, four bedrooms are to be provided.

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In a letter lodged with Dublin City Council outlining the rationale behind the application, Patrick Joyce, the Morrison’s hotel director, noted that the property was granted a five-star rating at the end of 2022 following major upgrade works to move to the Hilton Curio brand.

In his letter, Mr Joyce stated that the move to convert the meeting and event space to bedrooms was driven by two business imperatives – the high demand for additional bedroom space around central Dublin and the increased cost and difficulty of running meetings and events, particularly in a post Covid-19 environment.

Mr Joyce stated that as a five-star property “we feel that operating large scale late night events such as corporate events and weddings with large attendee numbers, will not meet the expectations of our resident guests up house who are not in attendance”.

Mr Joyce stated that the noise generated by these events would “negatively impact our guests’ experience and by association the business performance”.

“Repurposing the space to bedrooms will reduce late night noise to guests and for the local area,” he added.

Mr Joyce said that the application would give “the business the best long term proposition for staff and owners, allowing both to benefit from ongoing and future investment into the property”.