Eagle Four Reopens Newport Beach Hotel With Pendry Brand

Eagle Four Partners has reopened a 295-room hotel near Fashion Island as Pendry Newport Beach.

After a renovation, the Newport Beach-based private equity firm reopened the 20-story hotel at 690 Newport Center Drive, the Orange County Register reported. It had been closed since the pandemic in 2020.

Eagle Four bought a leasehold interest in the 20-story Fashion Island Hotel from the Irvine Company in February last year for $143 million. It then secured a $146 million loan for its renovation, according to The Real Deal.

The Pendry Newport Beach debuted this week under the management of Pendry Hotels & Resorts, owned by Irvine-based Montage International, a luxury hotel and management company founded two decades ago by Alan Fuerstman.

Pendry, launched in 2017, has eight hotels across the U.S., including properties in West Hollywood, San Diego and New York. A Pendry La Quinta is in the works.

Its hotel near Fashion Island mall has 114 suites overlooking the Pacific Ocean, Newport Harbor or Back Bay.

It has a spa, fitness center, a Tree Shack Bar & Grill by the hotel pool, a club for children ages 5 to 12 and a 58,000-square-foot indoor and outdoor meeting space. Rooms rent for about $400 a night.

Pendry aims to position its hotel in Newport Beach as a prime destination for dinner and drinks — as well as a “staycation” spot for locals — on top of the business and tourism trade of Newport Center. An interior redesign was done by Studio Munge, with architecture by WATG and landscaping by Burton Studio.

The Fashion Island Hotel was built by the Irvine Company in 1986. It was run by Four Seasons until the Irvine Company took over management in 2005 and renamed it Island Hotel Newport Beach. Five years ago, it was rebranded under the Fashion Island name.

Down the street, Eagle Four Partners is turning the former Newport Beach Marriott Hotel & Spa into a new Marriott-branded hotel called Vea Newport Beach. In 2020, Eagle Four and another investor bought the 400-room hotel for $216 million, the largest hotel deal in the state that year.

— Dana Bartholomew