A resort deep in the Florida Keys and an urban hotel in Minneapolis don’t have much in common, especially in winter. Yet despite their differences—the geek qualities of the Commons Hotel on the campus of the University of Minnesota and the sun-drenched bungalows of Little Palm Island Resort & Spa on Little Torch Key—both are ideal fits for Pat Colee’s portfolio.
“We don’t have a typical approach to the business,” says Colee, the founder and chairman of Noble House Hotels & Resorts. “Noble House is not all about a group of hotels. It’s all about each hotel and the significance within its community.”
To many, the company’s acquisition pace is probably shockingly slow. Noble House owns or manages just 18 hotels, despite the fact its first property, The Adolphus in Dallas, was purchased 34 years ago. And that was a fluke.
In 1980, Colee was running Westgroup Partner Inc., a Seattle-based company that developed office buildings. Its purchase of a block of downtown Dallas real estate came with a surprising bonus. “On the block was The Adolphus hotel, which at that point in time was very run-down but was kind of the grande dame of Dallas,” Colee explains. “We remodeled it, and it was hugely successful.”
After owning The Adolphus for about three years, Colee decided to create his own hotel ownership and management organization, which became the genesis of Noble House Hotels & Resorts. The company emphasized the guest experience and public spaces, striving to create living-room-like lobbies and top restaurant destinations.“We developed a philosophy then that we’ve retained all these years, which is to own our own backyard,” Colee says. “We’ve only grown when we felt like we could acquire a hotel where we could own the market.”
The gradual expansion began with the purchases of the Edgewater Hotel in Seattle and the Portofino Hotel & Marina in Redondo Beach, Los Angeles. By the mid-1980s, Colee says Noble House had grown to about four or five properties. According to Colee, Noble House has positioned its various holdings—including Colorado’s Gateway Canyon’s Resort, winner of “Best Luxury Hideaway in the Americas” in the 2013 World Luxury Hotel Awards—as 4.5-star properties. Looking to the future, though, Noble House is changing its approach. As the company continues to add hotels on the West Coast, Colee says it intends to create a new 3.5-star brand in addition to a separate 4.5-star Noble House brand.
“Right now, our intent is to double our size in the next five years,” he says. “As a result of who we are, we’re getting a lot of people asking us if we’d be interested in working with them on very special properties.” The company currently has about a half dozen projects in the works.
In May 2014, Noble House added its first international property, the Belize Ocean Club & Resort on the Central American nation’s Maya Beach. Colee says further expansion in the Caribbean is planned, and the company is even looking at some locations in China. The corporate mantra, however, will continue to emphasize three tenets: location, distinction, and soul. “If we can be an important part of the fabric of the community, then the business community and the residents of the community will recommend our hotel,” Colee says.
“It’s the same attitude everywhere we go,” he adds. “If it can’t be the best, we don’t want to do it.”
