Resort Saint Augustine is simply steps away from the Menil Campus.
John and Dominique de Menil introduced their deep understanding for arts and tradition to Houston after they settled right here within the Nineteen Forties. The couple’s legacy lives on by way of the Menil Assortment in Montrose and nonetheless conjures up individuals daily, together with the staff at Bunkhouse Resorts, an Austin-based hospitality group.
Fueled by a robust pull to the Menil’s campus (there isn’t any affiliation; simply enthusiastic fandom) and the neighborhood’s character, the Bunkhouse staff determined to debut its first Houston property, Resort Saint Augustine, steps away from the artwork museum. The idea, which spans 2.2 acres, boasts 71 rooms, an all-day foyer lounge, a heated pool, an 1,850-square-foot indoor and outside occasion area dubbed the Montrose Ballroom, and chef Aaron Bludorn’s latest restaurant, Perseid.
To maintain up with its custom of utilizing patron saints for lodge names, Bunkhouse selected “Augustine,” which honors Augustus Chapman Allen, one among Houston’s founders, and the abundance of Saint Augustine grass all through the town.
Omar Abreu, Resort Saint Augustine’s common supervisor, says the staff didn’t need the lodge to stay out like a sore thumb with a vertical format, stuffy halls, and cookie-cutter rooms like a typical lodge. As a substitute, they created an open ground plan with 5 distinctive buildings which are related by way of catwalks and outside pathways.
“For the [hotel’s] total imaginative and prescient, we needed to make this a vacation spot for vacationers and locals alike,” Abreu says.
Visitors test in on the entrance desk, which is surrounded by beautiful back-lit crimson lacquered cabinets.
Strolling into the foyer will make you’re feeling such as you’re stepping right into a millionaire’s residence. To the appropriate, by the entrance desk, is an area with back-lit crimson lacquered cabinets that maintain Bunkhouse branded objects and different merchandise on the market. Flip left to enter the primary lounge, which additionally doubles as a listening room, full with a document participant and a restored reel-to-reel tape deck for leisure. Preserve strolling by way of the area and also you’ll be met with a bigger lounge with intimate, cozy seating nooks and a bar serving cocktails, wine, beer, and a few gentle bites created by Bludorn. It’s good for company, in addition to locals who want to mingle.
Saint Augustine has eight “petite” rooms which are about 200 sq. toes and embrace a queen mattress. The lodge additionally affords choices for a studio king with a devoted lounge or office space, a studio double queen, a deluxe king, a deluxe king with a terrace, a premier king suite, and an atelier king suite. The value varies relying on the day of the week, however sometimes begins at $300 an evening.
For the buildout, Bunkhouse enlisted the assistance of Publish Firm, a New York– and Wyoming-based design studio, and Texas-based structure agency Lake Flato. The lodge and its rooms embrace nods to the Menil household. The suites’ sofas are embellished in a Charles James design—the style mastermind behind Dominique’s appears to be like. In her own residence, she discovered the white on the closets to be boring, so she painted every by hand to make them extra enjoyable. To honor her legacy, every closet panel is a unique colour. Nevertheless, for those who pay shut sufficient consideration, you’ll discover a scarcity of artwork on the partitions. This was carried out on function—Abreu says creativity is already flowing by way of the area and the neighborhood.
“I actually would love for us to be the beacon of the neighborhood,” Abreu says. “On the similar time, we’re seeking to construct Houston as a vacation spot for tradition and humanities.”
Those that keep at Resort Saint Augustine will discover a scarcity of artwork on the partitions.
And naturally, it’s no shock that the lodge turned to among the finest cooks in Houston for the on-site restaurant: none aside from chef Aaron Bludorn of Bludorn, Navy Blue, and Bar Bludorn. Perseid, which is called for the meteor bathe that occurs each summer time and the town’s historical past as an area epicenter, explores the variety of Houston by way of the lens of a French- and Gulf Coast–impressed bistro.
“As a result of Houston’s culinary hospitality scene is simply rising proper now at such an exponential charge, there are such a lot of younger, impartial operators doing actually cool stuff and actually pushing the boundaries—making this metropolis a real culinary vacation spot,” Bludorn says. “I hope [Perseid] solely perpetuates that.”
Cherif Mbodji, director of operations and associate at Bludorn and its sister eating places, says when conversations first started there was a right away connection between the 2 teams, and on condition that he and Bludorn each have French culinary backgrounds, it felt as if the celebrities aligned.
“The idea of a French bistro by way of the eyes of Houston…I feel it’s only a love letter to Houston as a culinary metropolis, the place you’ve got so many alternative influences [and] the place the vibrancy of meals is so palpable,” Mbodji says. “And French delicacies has a direct tie to a number of the Southern influences that all of us expertise.”
The Perseid menu will change seasonally. The present menu consists of stuffed squash blossoms with jambalaya, shrimp, and celery salad; crawfish sausage with Creole sauce; and blackened grouper with lengthy beans and black garlic hoisin.
In the summertime, menu objects shall be extra vegetable-focused, gentle, and refreshing. Bludorn says the identical sentiment goes for the restaurant’s cocktails. Whereas we proceed to outlive the unpredictable Houston winter, the menu will embrace extra spirit-forward cocktails, however come summer time, count on recent juices and different lighter elements.
Perseid additionally boasts a dessert program led by Bludorn’s govt pastry chef Maria Riddle. Suppose beignets with spiced berry coulis and crème brûlée with pineapple, in addition to coconut and makrut passionfruit anglaise.
Resort Saint Augustine and Perseid are welcome additions to Montrose and to the broader Houston space. The town is residence to a number of vertical eyesores concentrated in neighborhoods like Uptown and downtown, however this Bunkhouse property provides vacationers a brand new strategy to discover the town, whereas additionally serving as one other place for us locals to play.
“If you wish to meet up with some pals or [have] a date night time, this [hotel] is just about a one-stop store for that,” Abreu says.
