West Palm Beach is getting a new private golf club and luxury hotel after years of stagnation on the site of the Banyan Cay Resort.
Witkoff and Len Blavatnik’s Access Industries are splitting the former Banyan Cay resort into two parts: the Dutchman’s Pipe Golf Club and the Belgrove, a 194-room hotel, the Palm Beach Post reported. The private club is scheduled to open this fall, with initiation fees starting at $300,000, and the hotel is scheduled to open in November, just in time for South Florida’s peak season.
Witkoff, which is based in New York City and Miami Beach and is led by co-CEOs Steve and Alex Witkoff, partnered with Len Blavatnik’s Access Industries to buy Banyan Cay in January. Ari Pearl’s PPG Development now also has a stake in the project, according to the Post. The total sale price was not recorded in the deed, but the buyers received a $75 million loan from the seller, Los Angeles-based Calmwater Capital.
Calmwater bought the 200-acre site at an auction in federal bankruptcy court in West Palm Beach last August. Former Banyan Cay developer Domenic Gatto Jr. bought the site in 2015 for $26 million and built the Jack Nicklaus-designed golf course in 2017. Construction of a 150-room hotel stalled on and off until Calmwater won a $94.1 million foreclosure lawsuit against Gatto and Gatto’s Banyan Cay companies filed for bankruptcy last year.
The hotel was 85 percent complete when Witkoff, Access and PPG took control of the property, a spokesperson told the Palm Beach Post. When it opens in November, the Belgrove will have 25,000 square feet of meeting space, event space, a spa, a pool, a 150-room main building and 44 villas. The hotel and club will feature three dining options helmed by chef Julian Jouhannaud, the former executive chef of Le Bilboquet in New York City.
The Dutchman’s Pipe will be a welcome addition to the golf club scene in Palm Beach County, which has exploded in popularity thanks to the wave of wealthy buyers moving to the area during the pandemic. Current waiting lists for private clubs in and around Palm Beach are years long, and initiation fees have become more expensive with increased demand.
Developers and investors are also looking to enter the region’s hotel and restaurant sector. Billionaire and Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison invested $277 million in the Eau Palm Beach Resort & Spa in Manalapan earlier this month and plans to modernize the property. –– Kate Hinsche
