On what’s recently been rare in Baton Rouge, a gray and rainy afternoon, Developing Baton Rouge arrived at the corner of Third and Convention streets for a tour of the newly opened, highly impressive Watermark Hotel. Our tour guide was Kaitlin Posey, a native Mississippian and the hotel’s executive meeting manager.
The Watermark, part of the Marriott Autograph Collection family, is a renovation of Baton Rouge’s first skyscraper originally erected in 1927 as the Louisiana National Bank building. In the 1960s the building was used as a state office building and was purchased in 2014 by Wampold Properties. Besides being a 12 story piece of eye candy, this completed development marks another milestone in transforming downtown Baton Rouge from a 9-5 workweek center to a 24/7/365 livable neighborhood.
Check out our photo tour below:
Third Street entrance to the hotel. The 12 story building was one of Baton Rouge’s first high-rises.
Lenticular artwork in the hotel’s entrance. The decor of the hotel is an updated take on the building’s history. Local gallerist Ann Connelly curated the artwork to coordinate with this theme.
Registration lobby off the Third Street entrance
Registration desk
The hotel’s first floor focal point is the Gregory restaurant and bar, named for Angela Gregory (1903-1990), a Louisiana artist who created the pictured murals
The Gregory’s bar (their amaretto sour is on point)
The Gregory’s open kitchen boasts a wood fired oven and a Josper charcoal oven, one of only three in the United States, for slow cooking meat. More info on The Gregory can be found at: http://www.thegregorybr.com/
A portrait of Angela Gregory hangs on the first floor
The hotel’s private dining area, The Louisiana Purchase, boasts this modern walk-in wine cellar
The basement’s ‘Depository’ meeting room looks like something out a James Bond film
The basement’s ‘Foundation Room’ has original marbled walls and can hold 75 people
The hotel’s second restaurant, Milford’s, is an updated take on a traditional New York-style deli
Every floor’s elevator lobby has original photos of Baton Rouge, including this 12 floor photo of Governor Jimmy Davis’s motorcarde
Floor hallway
For scale, Jason showing the rooms’ height (tall!)
A corner suite room with views overlooking North Boulevard’s Town Square
A two-bed room overlooks downtown and the Mississippi River