What will Ritz-Carlton Key Biscayne look like after a $100M redo? See the plans

A popular luxury resort on the water in Key Biscayne has closed for a $100 million remodel to keep it competitive in drawing high-end travelers visiting South Florida.

The Ritz-Carlton, 455 Grand Bay Dr., suspended operations on May 1 and is scheduled to reopen the first week of December, executives at the developer Gencom said in an interview with the Miami Herald.

The Miami-based luxury hospitality and development firm manages nearly $8 billion in hotels and properties and is also behind the planned new Hyatt downtown on city-owned land near the Miami River. In that privately financed project, the Hyatt and next-door James L. Knight Center will be demolished and replaced by a three-tower complex, costing about $1.5 billion.

MORE: Mandarin Oriental hotel closing and will be replaced by new towers

The Key Biscayne resort

On Key Biscayne’s barrier island, the 13-story Ritz-Carlton resort covers 17 acres and has access to 600 feet of beach. It remains home to the Cliff Drysdale Tennis Center, the largest tennis facilities at any Ritz-Carlton resort and the site of charity tournaments that have drawn Venus and Serena Williams and Chris Evert.

The remodeled resort will have a total of 420 guest rooms and suites, unchanged from the hotel that just closed.

While the current trend among luxury hotels is to reduce the number of hotel rooms and increase private residences they sell, Gencom doesn’t want to go that route. That’s because they’ve long had such condos at their resort — among the earliest in South Florida to offer the combination.

“We already have a healthy mix,” said Ignasi Puig, senior vice president of acquisitions and investments at Gencom.

Another innovation by Gencom is that many of the condo owners can rent out their units through the hotel to travelers. The 420 figure includes 129 such units, and 291 traditional resort accommodations. That will remain the same after the remodeling.

The building and physical structures won’t be gutted, Puig said, allowing for a faster reopening.

Gencom originally opened the Ritz-Carlton in 2001 and later sold its majority stake. Brookfield Asset Management acquired that in 2022 when it bought Watermark Lodging Trust, which owned the resort at the time.

In 2024, Gencom bought Brookfield’s majority stake back, paying about $400 million, Bloomberg reported at the time. Today it owns over 70% of the resort, said Karim Alibhai, founder and principal of Gencom.

The remodeling is the first major renovation since the resort was built, he said.

Improvements at the Ritz-Carlton Key Biscayne

The outdoor facade, interiors, guest rooms and suites, spa, restaurants and outdoor amenities will be upgraded, based on “the resort’s island identity,” Gencom said. That includes using soft natural tones, lush greenery and colors and “textures that evoke the sand and seas.”

Ritz-Carlton’s exteriors will get new colors. The lobby “will undergo a complete transformation” with new East-facing glass facade to give views of the water. Inside, the lobby will incorporate natural textures and warm interior tones. And there will be a “completely refreshed signature restaurant” while the five food and beverage establishments will be improved.

The spa will undergo “a complete redesign” with themes of mangroves and the ocean. The 22 treatment rooms will be open to the public.

“The spa has become not just an amenity but a necessity” to high-end hotels, Alibhai said.

The remodeling is led by design architect Hart Howerton, who has also worked with Miami Dolphins owner Stephen Ross on his Apogee Golf Club in North Palm Beach.

Guests can also expect an expanded fitness center and swimming pools and 37,000 square feet of indoor and outdoor meeting and event space.

Hotel workers without work?

The hotel’s closing means that about 425 hotel employees were laid off. That’s according to a letter it sent in February to Florida officials, required as part of the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act, a federal law known as WARN.

WARN requires companies with more than 100 employees to give public notice ahead of mass layoffs or closure of employment sites.

Gencom’s founder Alibhai said the Marriott, which owns Ritz-Carlton, has found jobs for about 80% of the former Key Biscayne employees at their other hotels, mostly in South Florida or in Puerto Rico, and that health insurance will be provided through the shutdown period.

Alibhai wasn’t sure how many people would return to work at the remodeled hotel.

Why now? A new Miami

Twenty-five years may not seem like a long time for a building. But Alibhai said there’s much more competition today in the luxury hotel space. Miami has grown as tech and finance professionals have flocked to the region, remaking downtown.

The growing supply of accommodations combined with the world opening up post-COVID to tourists has affected South Florida’s hotel market.

“The last couple of years, growth has really flattened out,” Alibhai said. “But we view it as a great long-term market.”

Once the remodeling is done at the Ritz-Carlton Key Biscayne, it will boost average daily rates and occupancy rates, Gencom executives say.

“From a performance viewpoint, the hotel can be significantly better,” Alibhai said. “It was time.”

Renderings of what the Ritz will look like

This story was originally published May 9, 2025 at 11:23 AM.