Eco-friendly Wynwood hotel planned for Art by God site

150-key hotel would have up to 48 residential units

Rendering of Shepherd Eco Wynwood
Rendering of Shepherd Eco Wynwood

UPDATED, Dec. 17, 2:48 p.m.: A new eco-friendly hotel is expected to break ground on the site of the Art by God store in Wynwood.

Miami Beach-based Lucky Shepherd, co-founded by Christine Menedis and Naveen Trehan, will develop Shepherd Eco Wynwood at 60 Northeast 27th Street, joining a number of other hotels that have been proposed in the neighborhood. Hoar Program Management is the contractor on the project.

Touzet Studio is designing the 150-key hotel and Gensler is designing the interiors. In addition to hotel rooms, Shepherd Eco Wynwood will also have up to 48 residential units, according to a press release. The building will feature an outdoor amenity deck with a treehouse, a spa and wellness center, art gallery, rooftop pool and bar, speakeasy, and farm-to-table restaurant called Shepherd Farms.

Construction will begin in the summer, after the developer closes on the site for an undisclosed amount in the second quarter, a spokesperson said.

Property records show Art by God, a gift shop with minerals, fossils and other natural resources, led by Gene Harris, owns the Wynwood site. Andy Charry of Apex Capital Realty is representing the seller. CBRE, Mika Mattingly and Cecilia Estevez of Colliers International South Florida, and Michael Light of Douglas Elliman are representing the buyer.

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The hotel is expected to open in late 2022. It will be the first Shepherd Eco hotel.

The property will also have a garden paseo that runs between 26th and 27th streets, art walls, a sloped lawn for outdoor movies and concerns, and a canopied area. Cadence is designing the landscaping.

In September, DolphinBay Hospitality, a joint venture between Dolphin Capital Partners and Baywood Hotels, closed on the site of a planned Moxy by Marriott hotel in Wynwood. The partners paid $11 million, or about $630 per square foot, for the 17,500-square-foot site at 255 Northwest 25th Street.

Short-term rental operators such as Domio and Sonder have also secured leases for entire residential buildings or planned hotels in Wynwood.

An earlier version of this story misidentified the developer and the brokers involved.