Courtesy:Lawrence Hotel & Convention Center

A multimillion dollar remodeling project that involves making space for more fresh-baked cookies: Don’t worry, I’m not going to bore you with tales from my kitchen remodeling project. But I do have news about the major renovation underway at the former Holiday Inn at 200 McDonald Drive.

The Holiday Inn — the largest hotel and convention site in Lawrence — is no longer a Holiday Inn. The Holiday Inn sign was removed a few days ago and replaced with a simple one that reads “Lawrence Hotel & Convention Center.” But don’t get too attached to that catchy name. Soon enough the property will become a DoubleTree by Hilton, which is the hotel chain that gives out freshly baked chocolate chip cookies to its guests.

We reported on the planned change to a DoubleTree back in May. Hotel officials told me this week the DoubleTree deal is still very much going to happen, but the name change can’t occur until all the construction work at the property is complete.

“The Hilton officials won’t bless it until we show them that we are at a Hilton quality, and we definitely will be,” said Stephen Horton, general manager of the hotel.

The hotel has pulled building permits for $1.45 million worth of renovations at the site thus far. Currently 128 rooms in the 192-room hotel are closed as part of the remodeling process. Hotel officials weren’t ready to say yet when the hotel will fully reopen.

Work is well underway on the project, though. Here are some details:

• The project when complete will continue to have 192 rooms. But 70 of the rooms will be made larger. Interior rooms on the second, third and fourth floors will be expanded by 70 square feet each, which will allow for couches and a greater living room area. The hotel also will expand its number of suites to four, up from one today.

Courtesy:Lawrence Hotel & Convention Center

• Perhaps you remember the old Holidome lobby, which featured lots of plants, an indoor pool and a miniature golf course. (With that combination, you would have thought the golf balls would have floated and swimmers would understand ‘fore,’ but neither was the case.) Well, the pool remains, but the plants and golf course are gone. The new lobby will sport a whole new design, featuring lots of natural stone and many seating areas to accommodate small meetings.

Courtesy: Lawrence Hotel & Convention Center

• A portion of the lobby space will be devoted to a Made Market, a DoubleTree concept that sells lots of ready-to-eat meals, convenience items and other such merchandise that travelers may need, said Heather Shull, director of sales for the Lawrence hotel.

Courtesy:Lawrence Hotel & Convention Center

• The remodel will include a new breakfast bar area for hotel guests, but the hotel’s existing Boulevard Grill will remain open.

Community leaders will be watching the DoubleTree project, in part, because the hotel plays a large role in attracting lucrative conventions and conferences to town. The renovations don’t include adding significant new convention space to the property, but will include updates to the existing space.

Shull said the hotel will continue to have a little more than 18,000 square feet of convention and meeting space. She said it is being updated with new carpeting, wall coverings, new ceilings, more modern lighting and other technology upgrades.

Shull said the renovation project is giving the hotel a big opportunity to win new convention business for the community.

“We are really reaching out to business that we had years ago,” Shull said of the associations and other such groups that host annual conferences across the state. “We’re telling them that what we’re creating here is much different than what they previously experienced with us. Lawrence is such a fun town that we ought to have a lot of convention business. We just have to get the associations to consider moving some of their events out of Topeka and Kansas City.”

Shull said the facilities can easily host meetings of more than 350 people, banquets of 650 or more, and theater-style events upwards of 1,000 people.

“It definitely will help our meeting and convention business,” Shull said of the renovation and DoubleTree Brand. “Actually, we think that business is going to skyrocket.”

Courtesy: Lawrence Hotel & Convention Center