Vancouver hotel tower’s name to get ‘Trumped’ in rebranding
West Georgia Street 69-storey building, a magnet for ex-president’s critics, to reportedly be renamed for new company Paradox Hotels
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Shiny chrome, six-foot-tall letters spelling out “TRUMP” on the building gracing the north side of downtown Vancouver’s West Georgia Street have been covered in black, garbage-bag plastic for the last few days.
They will soon finally be removed, to be reportedly replaced by signage for a little-known, new company called Paradox Hotels.
The Trump signage had, until last week, remained in prominent view, even though the former Trump Hotel permanently closed back in August 2020.
Opening in 2017 amid a general global uproar over the early months of Donald Trump’s U.S. presidency, the 63-storey luxury hotel and expensive condo tower is no stranger to controversy.
In 2015, then-Vancouver mayor Gregor Robertson personally wrote to the developer, citing a petition of more than 50,000 names in support of asking it to “remove his brand and all that it represents from your building.”
After the hotel closed, ordinary passersby and residents who live in the condo building continued the call for the letters to come down.
There was, at the same time, public discussion about what high-profile brand might take over the hotel.
Now, there are signs online that it will be Paradox Hotels.
There is a link at Hotels.com, which contains the Paradox name in its URL, and points to the former Trump hotel’s address on West Georgia.
Paradox’s new website has been up for about 10 days and is collecting contact details so it can send out “exclusive news updates and offers.” There isn’t much other information, but there is a pop-up page that mentions its hotel properties in Thailand, Singapore and Canada.
The company has a presence on Linkedin’s Canadian site, as well as its Thai and Singaporean versions, but they all list a physical address in Richmond, B.C.
Tony Medd, senior director of operations at Paradox, answered the phone at the company’s listed number, but said he wasn’t able to comment.
The land and hotel in Vancouver continue to be owned by TA Global Berhad, a multinational Malaysian property company headed by Joo Kim Tiah, which paid licence rights to use the Trump name. It also owns hotels in Thailand and Singapore as well as other Canadian properties at Whistler that have been linked to Paradox Hotels.
Megan Schrader, a spokesperson with Vancouver-based Holborn Properties, which is also wholly-owned by TA Global, said she was unable to provide specific details. She did, however, “confirm that the hotel will be reopening next year under an exciting new operator and that the signage at 1161 West Georgia Street is being removed as part of the rebranding efforts that are now well underway.”
Holborn plans to make a formal announcement early next year about the new hotel, she said.
The City of Vancouver said it hasn’t received an application to remove or replace the existing Trump sign.
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