{"id":14248,"date":"2019-08-20T11:25:02","date_gmt":"2019-08-20T09:25:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.riu.com\/blog\/?p=14248"},"modified":"2019-08-20T13:31:52","modified_gmt":"2019-08-20T11:31:52","slug":"hotels-riu-plaza-luis-riu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.riu.com\/blog\/en\/hotels-riu-plaza-luis-riu\/","title":{"rendered":"Luis Riu takes us through the history of the Riu Plaza project, RIU’s line of urban hotels"},"content":{"rendered":"

With the opening of the Riu Plaza Espa\u00f1a hotel, a new milestone in the history of the RIU chain has been reached and for the Riu Plaza line of urban hotels<\/strong>. This has led me to reflect over the last few days on the first steps we took almost a decade ago to launch our own line of city hotels.<\/p>\n

After having stayed true to our roots for over 50 years, focusing fully on beach hotels, I am certain that when we announced our first project, the Riu Plaza Panama<\/a>, it was a surprise to friends and strangers alike.*** More than ten years have now passed and we currently have ten hotels in some of the most important cities in the world<\/strong>. We have opened seven already and three more are underway. Therefore I think it will be worthwhile to go over the important milestones of this really important line of hotels in the RIU Hotels chain.<\/p>\n

\"Hotel<\/a>

Hotel Riu Plaza Espa\u00f1a, one of Luis Riu’s latest projects.<\/p><\/div>\n

Panama City: the ideal location from which to launch RIU’s urban hotels project<\/h2>\n

In mid-2007 I had planned to visit Playa Blanca on Panama’s Pacific coast. We were going there to take a look at the piece of land which would eventually become the Riu Playa Blanca hotel in 2014. The hotel was not built until 2014 because our first RIU urban hotel became our main focus. It was really difficult to find an available room in Panama City and the prices were so high that I realised that we had found the perfect location for launching our RIU Hotels’ urban project<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\"Entrance<\/a>

Entrance to the Riu Plaza Panam\u00e1 hotel, the first urban hotel that Luis Riu opened 10 years ago.<\/p><\/div>\n

Almost all the major Spanish chains already had an urban line of hotels. Naturally, from time to time we came across opportunities to do the same but we had always remained loyal to our holiday hotels format. Some members of the team were really enthusiastic about venturing into the city, but it wasn’t until I saw the reality on the ground in Panama that I truly felt that the moment had finally arrived.<\/p>\n

Luis Riu: \u201cWe had to face new challenges with our first urban hotel in Panama\u201d<\/h3>\n

I found a plot of land on Calle 50 in the city’s financial district <\/strong> and all the teams set to work on bringing the project to life. This time we not only had to decide what the building would look like and how we would design its interior, we also had to face challenges unlike any we had seen before:<\/p>\n