First Hilton hotel in Cayman: US$60m wellness resort planned

Global brand Hilton is coming to the Cayman Islands.
Local developer NCB Group has inked an US $60 million deal with the chain to build its first hotel here Curio Collection by Hilton.
NCB  Group Managing Director Matthew Wight said the proposed resort aims to help Cayman break into the growing wellness tourism industry.
“Wellness tourism was a $68 billion industry last year and it is by far one of the fasting growing types of tourist travel,” said Mr. Wight.

Mr. Wight is hoping to tap into that multi-billion dollar industry through the construction of the Cayman Islands first Hilton hotel, the Curio Collection.

It is a brand targeted at wellness tourism.

“For us, it was really important to create an environment, something different than what Cayman has to offer and have our travelers come here and experience wellness travel. That’s the focus on the food farm to table, that’s the focus on the renewable aspects of the hotel, the operations of it,” said Mr. Wight.

Wellness tourism is traveling for the purpose of health and well-being.
It can be through spiritual or psychological activities and Mr. Wight said these components built into the vision for the new hotel.

“That’s just their out of body experience that they have from they arrive through their whole stay. So we have created this seventh floor kind of wellness retreat for our guests,” he said.

Mr. Wight said he wants his fellow Caymanians to not only be part of his vision, but his team.

“Our hope is that our hotel can attract a number of Caymanians to work in long-term. There is going to be over 50 jobs permanently in the hotel excluding the restaurants etc. So we are excited to get as many Caymanians on board with us as possible,” said Mr. Wight.

He said construction of the seven- storey, 90-room resort is expected to attract more than 200 jobs.
Mr. Wight believes the West Bay Road location falls in line with the wellness brand.

“The difficulty with the site was marrying that we do not have Seven Mile Beach. We have the view, but not Seven Mile Beach and we have the proximity to town. So we wanted the combination of the business traveler, as well as, the wellness traveler,” Mr. Wight added.

Construction of the wellness hotel is expected to begin in April.
The new hotel will be built out in three phases with a completion date of 2021.