New life for downtown's Sheraton-Lincoln

So here's something interesting for people who keep track of abandoned downtown buildings: The Houston Business Journal reports that Omni Hotels has plans to revamp the old Sheraton-Lincoln into a luxury suite hotel. The 28-story hotel at 717 Polk Ave. opened in 1962 and closed in 1986; according to the folks at the Houston Architecture Forum, the nearby Hyatt Regency bought the building in the late 1990s for a proposed expansion, but that deal fell through. The ex-Sheraton was gutted at that point to get rid of asbestos, and it's been an empty shell ever since.

Onmi said it'll convert the building into a hotel with more than 400 suites, 30,000 square feet of meeting space and a 13,000-square-foot wellness center complete with a salon and spa. There'll also be "multiple culinary venues," though we're not sure if any of them will be quite as classy as one of the Sheraton's original restaurants, the Cheshire Cheese, which was described as "an old English Beefe House." Nor are we convinced that the luxury suites will be able to match the "transistorized console equipped with TV and Radio Selector" that each room featured in 1962. (Seriously, check out the old brochure at the architecture forum. It's so classy.)

The hotel redevelopment is expected to begin later this year, with the new hotel opening in 2009.