Overview
Pencil in this one for a future getaway: a sprawling 100-acre spot in the Yarra Valley that's home to a 300-bed hotel, an outdoor concert venue, three restaurants, lakes and gardens to roam around, and an arts and craft village. Come 2024, that's set to become a new place to add to your holiday itineraries, all on the Maroondah Highway just over an hour's drive from Melbourne.
Here, you'll be able to see a gig, then not only bunker down for the night but truly make a weekend of it. It's envisaged that the new site will play host to big names, spanning both local and international acts — and also showcase local growers, artisans, winemakers, distillers and brewers.
Specifics such as who'll run the hotel and what the restaurants will offer haven't yet been revealed, however, and development plans are still to be lodged. That said, helping boost the state's tourism and live entertainment industries after the past couple of tough years is one of the project's big aims.
The just-announced $200-million precinct springs from Cedar Mill Group, which is owned by Newcastle-based property development firm Winarch Capital, and has just snapped up the land to bring this plan to fruition. It's the company's third such development in the works, and the first in Victoria — following Cedar Mill Lake Macquarie, which is revamping a golf course and adding a 30,000-person concert venue, cafes, restaurants, accommodation and a huge aquatic park; and Cedar Mill Hunter Valley, a 40-hectare spot in in Pokolbin that's set to open in late 2023 with a 22,000-person amphitheatre, a 100-room hotel and a wine museum.
Cedar Mill Group is also still looking for other sites around Australia — so that list might grow in the near future.
And, yes, adding new spots for Aussies holidays to your getaway bucket list is becoming easy of late. There's also the in-the-works new hotel in the Barossa, smack bang in the middle of a vineyard; the about-to-open QT Newcastle, which includes a rooftop bar and a suite in a clock tower; and Sydney's Porter House Hotel, which'll launch in July with a five-story restaurant and bar hub next door.
And, there's the just-opened first Down Under outpost for Ace Hotels, the soon-to-open The Langham on the Gold Coast, design-driven Marriott chain AC Hotels' first Aussie site and the 2025 local debut of The Waldorf Astoria, too.
The Cedar Mill Group's Yarra Valley site is expected to open in 2024. For more information about its plans, head to the company's website.