Kolter Plans Twin 44-Story Condo Towers on St. Pete's Hilton Bayfront Site

Kolter Urban has filed a site plan application for two 44-story condominium towers on the site of the Hilton St. Petersburg Bayfront in downtown St. Petersburg. The redevelopment is estimated at about $325 million and would replace the 15-story hotel at 333 1st Street South with 325 condo units, roughly 18,000 square feet of commercial space and a 519-space parking garage, according to St. Pete Rising.

What Happened

The Delray Beach developer circulated the site plan application to neighborhood and business groups, which is how the first details of the project became public on October 12 St. Pete Rising. The towers, designed by 10 Design, would rise up to 509 feet. One would face 1st Street South and the other would sit at the corner of 2nd Street South and 4th Avenue South on the 3.01-acre block St. Pete Rising.

The application lists about 1.32 million square feet of proposed building area, compared with about 344,000 square feet in the existing hotel. Kolter is seeking a floor area ratio of 7.0. The commercial space is listed at 17,988 square feet. In addition to the 519-space garage, Kolter would make 207 spaces in the neighboring Saltaire garage available to residents, for a total of 726 spaces. Vehicle and pedestrian access would come from 1st Street South, 2nd Street South and 4th Avenue South St. Pete Rising.

At 509 feet, the towers would tie for the third-tallest buildings in the city. Only the 515-foot Residences at 400 Central and the planned 539-foot Waldorf Astoria Residences at 150 2nd Avenue South would be taller. The project would also hold more homes than any completed condo tower in St. Petersburg, including the 301-unit Residences at 400 Central St. Pete Rising.

Background on the Site

The Hilton Bayfront was built in 1972 and renovated in 2014. It has 333 guest rooms, 33 meeting rooms and about 47,710 square feet of event space, and it sits across from Al Lang Stadium, The Dalí Museum and the Mahaffey Theater St. Pete Rising. An SEC filing dated February 20, 2026 showed that Ashford Hospitality Trust subsidiaries signed a purchase agreement with a Kolter affiliate on December 12, 2025 St. Pete Rising.

Kolter closed on the property in March 2026 for $96 million. At the time, the company said the 1970s-era hotel would eventually be demolished and replaced with a taller residential building that takes advantage of the water views, and that it was looking for a hospitality brand partner Tampa Bay Times. The parcel is zoned Downtown Center-1, one of the city's densest districts, with a base floor area ratio of 3.0 that can exceed 7.0 with public approval and bonuses St. Pete Rising.

The block has a long history with Kolter. In 2019, Ashford sold the hotel's 1.65-acre surface parking lot to Kolter for $17.5 million. That lot became the 35-story Saltaire, completed in 2023, and Kolter later sold 205 garage spaces back to the hotel for $4 million in 2022 St. Pete Rising.

Where Things Stand

• Approvals: The site plan application has been circulated, but its approval status has not been reported. The requested 7.0 floor area ratio is above the district's base and depends on public approval and bonuses.
• Schedule: No project name, pricing, construction timeline or hotel closure date has been announced St. Pete Rising.
• Developer pipeline: Kolter's completed downtown towers include ONE St. Petersburg, Saltaire and Art House. It also has approval for a 21-story, 62-unit condo at the former Fit2Run site and is planning Water Club St. Pete Beach St. Pete Rising. In Tampa, Kolter is building One Tampa Tampa Bay Times.

Brian Van Slyke, Kolter's regional president for Florida's West Coast, told the Tampa Bay Times in March that demand for luxury condos remained strong from local buyers and people relocating from out of state Tampa Bay Times.

Implications for Owners, Developers, Contractors and Subs

• Demolition and abatement: Replacing a 1972 hotel of more than 340,000 square feet on a busy downtown block is a significant demolition package on its own, with logistics constrained by three active street frontages and neighboring towers.
• Two-tower sequencing: Twin towers of 44 stories over a shared garage raise questions about phasing, crane placement and whether both towers rise together or one follows the other. Those decisions will shape when foundation, structure and envelope packages reach the market.
• Coastal high-rise scope: Waterfront towers of this height in Tampa Bay bring demanding envelope, wind and flood design requirements, which favor subcontractors with high-rise curtain wall, post-tensioned concrete and vertical transportation experience.
• Hospitality operations: Until a closure date is set, the hotel remains a working business. Owners planning similar hotel-to-residential conversions should expect long lead times between acquisition, entitlement and demolition.

What to Watch

• Formal filing and review dates before the city's development review bodies.
• Any announcement of a hospitality or residential brand partner, a project name and sales launch.
• A hotel closure date, which would set the start of demolition.
• Selection of a general contractor for the towers.

Bottom Line

Kolter's plan would put two of the tallest buildings in St. Petersburg on one of its most prominent waterfront blocks and add more condo units than any single completed tower in the city. The project is at the site plan stage with no schedule announced, but it adds a large demolition and high-rise package to the downtown pipeline in the coming years.

Image credit: Kolter Urban. Image from the source article.

Sources

• St. Pete Rising, "Two 44-story towers planned for Hilton Bayfront site in downtown St. Pete": https://stpeterising.com/home/two-44-story-towers-planned-for-hilton-bayfront-site-in-downtown-st-pete
• St. Pete Rising, "Hilton Bayfront in downtown St. Pete to be sold to prominent developer for $96 million": https://stpeterising.com/home/hilton-bayfront-in-downtown-st-pete-to-be-sold-to-prominent-developer-for-96-million
• Tampa Bay Times via Yahoo Finance, "Kolter to build two new condos in downtown St. Petersburg. Here's where": https://finance.yahoo.com/sectors/technology/articles/kolter-build-two-condos-downtown-181005127.html