Sainte Claire Hotel is Becoming a Westin

Recently the news broke that Wolff Urban Development (owned by Lew and Keith Wolff) purchased the Sainte Claire Hotel  from Larkspur Hotels. Turns out they are not only going to do a remodel of all the rooms and hallways, but they are also re-branding it as a Westin. This would make it only the second hotel with a Starwood affiliation in San Jose, the other being the Four Points Sheraton across the street. Other affiliated hotels with Starwood are Aloft, Element, Le Meridien, W Hotels, The Luxury Collection, and St. Regis.

I'm pretty stoked as Starwood is by far my favorite hotel chain. In fact, I've done a ton of travel this year and last week I hit my 25th Starwood stay for 2011 at--appropriately for me--the Four Points in Downtown San Jose (which is probably the nicest Four Points in the world right now). As for the Westin, this is a very strong brand and will no doubt attract many business travelers and perhaps even a few weekend vacationers. Next on my Starwood wishlist is a hip W Hotel anywhere Downtown.

For more info on the Westin San Jose, click here.

1,000th Post!

The San Jose Blog hits a huge milestone today. This is our one thousandth post! This is also a special number because it represents roughly the number of page views we get every day. Not too shabby for a niche blog devoted to people that love San Jose. This is certainly more than ever expected when the blog launched mid-2009 and proves there are a lot of people out there that are as excited about this city as we are.

To celebrate, today we're launching our new logo. This was designed by the talented Brian Jensen, who also does work for Content Magazine. You can check out his site over here. Please give him a call if you ever need design work, he's fantastic! We're also going with a cleaner template that dramatically increases the speed of the site (especially on Chrome).

Thanks for reading and continuing to make this blog a success. If you ever feel like contributing posts please don't hesitate to reach out. We're looking for more bloggers, especially someone interested in covering local music. 

San Jose is hitting an inflection point, and you're going to see a lot of great things happening over the next 20 years in terms of development, culture, arts, sports, and transportation. We'll look forward to documenting these changes and contributing any way we can to make the city a better place. Cheers, and hope you'll stick around for the next 1,000 posts!

San Pedro Square Market Updates

I have a few updates from my favorite development project in San Jose, the San Pedro Square Market. First off, Robee's Falafel and Little Chef Counter are now open and both are exceptional. The concept of the Market is really starting to task shape. Last week I took some family there and grabbed a couple pizzas from Pizza Bocca Lupo, a falafel plate from Robee's, blueberry mojitos from the San Pedro Square Market Bar, cold cuts from Vino Vino, and several dishes from Little Chef Counter such as hand-cut fries covered with short-ribs and cheese. It's hard for me to even image how awesome this place will be after some of the other eateries open up.

Speaking of the other eateries coming soon, we have a Vietnamese sandwich shop, a crepe place, a smoke house & BBQ, a taco stand (this will be right next to the bar), Treatbot, and a raw bar / lounge. This last one is what I would like to focus on today. I just received a transcript from an interview with Taylor Kim, the owner of Blush Raw Bar & Lounge. I think they found the perfect location for their concept, I can't wait!

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Q: How did you come up with the name Blush?

A: The name “blush” captures both our ambience and our unique drink concept, which are slush cocktails.

Q: What kind of food will be on your menu?

A: Our Raw Bar boasts a food menu that offers a variety of small cold dishes, sushi, and oysters.  Along with a traditional drink selection, our cocktail menu features a unique and innovative fusion of slush mix drinks, yet to be introduced in California

Q: What made you pick San Pedro Square Market for your new establishment?

A: We have been pursing to open Blush for the past 2 years, searching the bay area for the perfect location. We heard about a new project in Downtown San Jose, and we thought that would be the ideal location for Blush.

Q: When will Blush be open?

A: Blush will be opening in late February to early March. 

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New San Jose Marriott Hotel(s)!

Finally, a new major construction project! Barry Swenson is planning to break ground on an 8 story building that encompasses two different Marriott hotels, SpringHill Suites (146 rooms) and Residence Inn (175 rooms). The building will be located on the corner of Airport and North First and should be ready for prime time by summer 2014. I'm hoping they'll add at least a restaurant that is easily accessible from the street.

The market for hotel financing is brutal right now, so that fact that this project is a go bodes well for the San Jose region. For more info, click here.

Happy New Year!

Hope you all have a very happy and prosperous 2012!

Saturday Stats: Google's Fastest-Rising Searches

Every year Google publishes the fastest rising searches in a site called Google Zeitgeist. The top 5 searches in 2011 for the Bay Area were:

1.) Santa Cruz
2.) Golden Gate Park
3.) Santana Row
4.) Sfgate
5.) Contra Costa Times

We made the list at least =). Thanks to Dan for finding this one.

Free VTA Rides New Year's Eve

You just got one more reason to party hard in San Jose this New Year's Eve... free VTA rides.  Between 7pm on Dec 31 and 4am on Jan 1, light rail and bus service will be free of charge!

EnVerv Raises $12M

San Jose's EnVerv has just closed a $12M round of Series B funding. The company is a fabless semiconductor company that is making SoC (System on a Chip) solutions for smart grid and metering applications. In other words, they make chips that would go in smart meters like the ones PG&E is now using.

For more info, click here.