TSOGO Sun and Southern Sun have started building a further R700m office and hotel development on its Montecasino precinct in Fourways, bringing the group’s development there to R2,5bn in the past decade.

JULIUS BAUMANN

The development, The Pivot, will include the 194-room Montecasino Southern Sun hotel, the first purpose-built hotel to be built under the Southern Sun brand in 20 years. The Pivot will have 14000m² of A-grade office space, a small retail component and a 1400m² conference centre. Tsogo Sun project partners Abland will manage the office space.

“We have already had surprisingly strong interest in the office space, and expect good take up when the development opens in July next year,” Abland CEO Dave Savage said yesterday.

Southern MD Graham Wood said the hotel would have 92 double-double rooms (two double beds) to cater better for sports events. In line with the Italian theme of Montecasino, the hotel will be modelled on the Palazzo Corsini, a 15th century villa on the slope between Gianicolo and Rome’s River Tiber.

The hotel, to open before the rest of the development next May to benefit from the 2010 Soccer World Cup, will be third on the property after the three-star 246 room SunSquare and five-star 179 room Palazzo hotels.

Jabu Mabuza, group CEO of Tsogo Sun and chairman of Southern Sun, said 9-million people visited Montecasino yearly. The new development was likely to increase footfall through the complex.

Montecasino is also likely to benefit from the City Lodge Hotel being built opposite. That hotel will have 211 rooms, and it is scheduled to open this December.

Source: Business Day