Kirkland's Home Away From Home -- Woodmark Keeps Clients Coming Back

KIRKLAND

Like most of the other leading hotels on the Eastside and in Seattle, the Woodmark is completely booked for next month's PGA Championship at Sahalee Country Club near Redmond.

One company alone booked half the rooms at the small hotel in Kirkland's exclusive Carillon Point. Two others are taking smaller blocks of rooms.

Filling every room is great for the bottom line, but not if it means alienating regular customers. So months ago, the Woodmark sent letters to its most frequent customers, warning them that they would need to book early if they wanted to stay during the golf tournament.

The personal touch is apparently paying off.

Nine years after the Woodmark opened as one of the first businesses at Carillon Point, it's still the only hotel on Lake Washington.

With 100 rooms, it is one of three "boutique hotels" on the Eastside that appeal to customers who don't believe that bigger is necessarily better. The others are the Bellevue Club, formerly the Bellevue Athletic Club, and the Salish Lodge overlooking Snoqualmie Falls.

With its waterfront location and a tent for outdoor gatherings, the Woodmark hosts more than 100 weddings a year. More than half the rooms offer a view of Lake Washington or a small creek running through the grounds of Carillon Point.

Wolfgang Rood of Gordon/Rood Hospitality Consulting says the Woodmark "has really become popular with high-level kinds of executives who are looking for somewhere special to stay in the Bellevue area and are looking for just that kind of place where you can walk outside and go to the pier, and you have little shops around."

It also has become popular among celebrities. Guests have included singers Paul McCartney, Tony Bennett and Naomi Judd, Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, actor Anthony Quinn, sports legends Muhammad Ali and Arnold Palmer, and photographer Annie Leibovitz.

Broadway singer-actress Bernadette Peters stayed at the Woodmark when she was in town last month for the grand opening of the Kirkland Performance Center. Musician Kenny G, who brought a number of guests to the Woodmark for the housewarming of his Hunts Point home two years ago, still drops by from time to time when friends stay there.

Actress Teri Garr sometimes checks in at the Woodmark before or after sailing excursions in the San Juan Islands.

"Celebrities and business CEOs and foreign visitors who are important to some of our corporate customers feel very comfortable here because they are somewhat anonymous. We've had celebrities stay with us, and we don't get the autograph seekers," said Pam Graber, the Woodmark's general manager.

The hotel is used by locals for meetings, weddings and other gatherings. The spiral staircase in the main lobby has become a popular backdrop for bridal photos, even for some weddings that take place elsewhere.

At $175 to $240 a night, room rates are slightly below those of the Hyatt Regency Bellevue and significantly below the Salish Lodge. The most expensive suite - with living room, fireplace, dining room and two balconies - goes for $1,300,

The hotel is owned by Carillon Properties, an arm of the Kirkland-based Skinner Corp., which developed Carillon Point.

Graber, a Seattle native who began her career at the Seattle Sheraton, was managing the Sheraton Russell Hotel in New York City when she was hired by the Woodmark in 1994.

Graber has made several changes aimed at solidifying the hotel's appeal. One was to replace the former Carillon Room restaurant with Waters, which offers more varied and trendier fare.

She also presided over a renovation of all rooms and suites as well as the "library lounge." And she changed its name, from the Woodmark Hotel at Carillon Point to the Woodmark Hotel on Lake Washington, playing up its unique location.

The result has been a loyal clientele and a healthy occupancy rate. In contrast to the 78 percent average occupancy at Eastside hotels, Graber reports the Woodmark's as "in the mid-80s."

Among that number are some very regular guests.

Ron Pompei, the New York-based architect and designer who designed Anthropologie in University Village, stays at the Woodmark even when he's doing business in hotel-rich Seattle.

Pompei perceives the Woodmark as "more of a European hotel" in its modest size and personal attention, including helping him hold business meetings in his room.

Cassandra Santisteban, a marketing executive at AT&T Wireless who works out of her home in Sacramento, stays at the Woodmark twice a month when she's in town for business meetings.

"I'm not the president of the company or anything. They have no idea what I do," Santisteban said. "They just know I'm a guest, and they're going to take care of me."

Keith Ervin's phone number is 206-515-5632. His e-mail address is: kervin@seatletimes.com