Big Business
Austin hotel and conference center unveils major expansion plans
The AT&T Hotel and Conference Center is set to unveil some major changes at the start of next year. Thirty-thousand square feet of floor space will be added to the campus-area event center as part of the University of Texas at Austin’s McCombs School of Business Rowling Hall development.
The new expansion was designed by New York architecture firm Ennead Architects, known for work at international campuses including the University of Michigan, Arizona State University, and Purdue, and will include the Zlotnik Family Ballroom, a flexible 15,000-square-foot space that can host everything from weddings and business meetings to raves (there probably won’t be raves).
The showcase of the ballroom will be a mural from Brooklyn-based artist José Parlá, a monumental work that a release says “will highlight Austin’s natural environment and cityscape and will feature Parlá’s characteristic traces of collage, pulled impasto surfaces, and signature calligraphic marks.”
The new wing, including nine new meeting rooms, will be connected to the older building through a light-filled enclosed walkway. Doors will open by January 2018.