PHILADELPHIA—Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants, and the City of Philadelphia, announced that one year after opening, Kimpton Hotel Palomar Philadelphia and Square 1682 restaurant have been awarded LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification at the Gold level by the U.S. Green Building Council and verified by the Green Building Certification Institute (GBCI). LEED is the preeminent program for the design, construction and operation of high-performance green buildings. The milestone marks the first LEED certified hotel and restaurant for Kimpton and for Philadelphia.
“This achievement truly marks a milestone in Kimpton’s history and 29-year initiative of sustainability,” said Mike Depatie, CEO at Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants. “Since our founding, we have strived to lead the charge of environmental change in the hospitality industry through our extensive EarthCare program. With more than 100 eco-friendly operating practices and eco-friendly products firmly in place, turning our attention to sustainable development of hotels is the next logical step for continuous evolution of EarthCare.”
“Kimpton has taken the lead in demonstrating how the hospitality community can impact greener destinations for visitors, business travelers and convention attendees,” said Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter. “This is a shining gold star in Philadelphia’s effort to become America’s Greenest City by 2015.”
One of First to Emphasize ‘Green’
A collection of 50 boutique hotels and 54 chef-driven restaurants in 22 major metropolitan cities, Kimpton broke the mold on cookie-cutter lodging in 1981 when founder Bill Kimpton pioneered the idea of hospitality with personality. Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants led the way in the hospitality industry by being one of the first hotel companies to make environmental concerns a company-wide focus.
Kimpton Hotel Palomar Philadelphia, a 230-room hotel with 6,000 square feet of meeting space, and Square 1682, a chef-driven restaurant, is a thoughtful adaptive reuse of one of Philadelphia’s architectural landmarks, a historically significant 1929 Art Deco design by Paul Philippe Cret. Located at 17th and Sansom streets in Philadelphia’s Rittenhouse Square neighborhood, and known as the Architects Building, it once served as the headquarters of the Philadelphia chapter of the American Institute of Architects.
Kimpton worked with the Morristown, N.J. office of Gensler and hotel designer Dayna Lee of Powerstrip Studio in Hollywood, Calif., to refurbish the 80-year-old landmark structure, Kimpton’s 11th adaptive reuse development.
LEED Criteria from U.S. Green Building Council
To achieve LEED certification from the U.S. Green Building Council, the building’s design and operations are measured in multiple categories, including: energy savings, water efficiency, CO2 emissions reduction, improved indoor environmental quality, and stewardship of resources and sensitivity to their impacts. The new HVAC system optimizes energy performance with special green settings to ensure the least amount of energy possible is used. Other important LEED certification standards that are part of the design include: daylight in 90 percent of all hotel spaces, reducing water usage by 20 percent, and having at least 10 percent recycled content in the materials and resources used in the design. Kimpton Hotel Palomar Philadelphia is also working to support green power, by purchasing enough renewable energy credits equivalent to two years’ power demand.
Go to the Kimpton Hotel Palomar Philadelphia.
