Hotel Formentor News
Hotel Formentor, now a Four Seasons hotel, has been completely refurbished after a global investment of €350m. In the next stage, nine luxury villas will be added to the property.
With building permissions such a hot topic, this does seem a bit much, however, the hotel has not exhausted its building potential which amounts to 468 hectares. In fact the Formentor Hotel already had villas or chalets before Four Seasons took over, they were marketed as rooms just with more privacy.
Following the success of branded residences in Madrid, the Four Seasons is repeating the formula in Mallorca. The nine homes, which the hotel chain will market as branded residences, will come with associated services that are of the utmost luxury, the same as in the actual hotel.
The Mallorcan architects Ángel Sánchez-Cantalejo and Vicente Tomás, who already collaborated on the hotel’s renovation with the Lamela studio, will develop the new projects.
Building Controversies at Hotel Formentor
The Council of Pollensa has fined Inmobiliaria Formentor SA, the company that owns the hotel, for €5.1m for rebuilding the hotel without the corresponding permit. The mayor, Martí March, signed the municipal resolution last week, where it states that the actions undertaken by the company are considered “serious” according to the urban planning law of the Balearic Islands.
The company was given 15 days to appeal. If they admit responsibility or waive any appeal the fine could be reduced, by 40%, to just over €3m.
The situation dates back to November 2022 when the mayor at the time issued an order to stop the works following a municipal technical report which (in response to a previous complaint from the GOB and Junts Avançam) estimated that the Renovation and Renovation and Extension licenses that the property had obtained did not cover the demolition works they were carrying out.
In fact, the works were not stopped at any time and the property began the reconstruction work. Although the property’s initial project was to carry out a comprehensive renovation of the hotel, it ended up demolishing the original building, which Hotel Formentor say it had to do for safety reasons due to aluminosis problems in the concrete.
During this time, Pollensa Town Hall has opened several urban planning infringement proceedings for demolition and non-compliance with the original licence and although the demolition has already been legalised, there were still some proceedings pending resolution. Among them, the one that has been resolved today, which imposes a multi-million euro fine on Inmobiliaria Formentor SL.
There have been other building disputes. Among them, the dispute with the Town Hall to determine the ownership of the Formentor car park; the possible felling of pine trees in the area; the management of construction waste and the construction of a heliport in the hotel complex.
