Queer News Tonight has been on this story since the beginning of the year. Executive Producer Al Ferguson has been trying to interview hotel staff in Miami and at corporate headquarters in Barcelona. After repeated attempts, Silvia Perez Vinolas, Director of Marketing & Communications in Barcelona confirmed the closure but asked us to wait to report the story until March. Queer News Tonight has decided that this request was unreasonable. We can report tonight that Axel Hotels, the largest LGBTQ hotel and hetero-friendly brand in the world, will close its only USA location in March. According to Axel, the chain had occupancy of 75% LGBTQ and 25% heterosexual. The hotel has 8 locations in Europe and Axel South Beach Miami was its largest at 160 rooms. The adult-only hotel property is located at the 1500 block of Collins Avenue. The hotel opened to much fanfare with slogans like
“Yeah, I’m Going To Miami Beach. I’m A 90’s Bitch” and “I’m here, Beach”.
Vinolas said about the closure,
“This closing was a pure business decision from the building owners since they decided to move forward with a new project and they need to do an important renovation to the facilities, which requires the building to be closed and available for that for a long time. We cannot communicate this info so far, but once we can release it we will provide you interviews and all the info you need for your story.”
Inquiries to property ownership were not returned. Several sources close to the hotel said that a decision was made to renovate the property into a more financially successful use of the property. It appears that the new property will have no association with the South Beach LGBTQ community. Another source close to the hotel revealed that the hotel has been market stressed for a long period since its January 2020 opening. In addition to the COVID-19 pandemic, the hotel average daily rates were generally far lower than many other comparable South Beach hotels. Axel South Beach was the largest full-service LGBTQ hotel in America that featured food & beverage, resort features, and was home to many queer South Florida events. Ironically the only Axel in the Western Hemisphere will now be in Havana.
Previously Axel South Beach was known as the Haddon Hall Hotel. Axel talks about the uniqueness of the South Beach community and this gay hotel saying on their website
“In the middle of Collins Avenue, at the heart of the Art Deco universe of pastel pink and green colors of the Flamingo Park Historic District of South Beach, you will find the building that is home to our first hotel in the USA. An authentic treasure from 1940, restored to its original grandeur and recognized with the Award for Historic Preservation and Restoration by AIA Florida. Miami is the place where everything is reinvented. Versace reinvented fashion, Gloria Estefan reinvented music and Beckham reinvented a football team. But reinventing is maintaining the nature of a thing while adding something new that updates it.”
Reinvention is definitely coming with an anticipated closing of Axel South Beach on March 30.
