Houston’s New Sky-High Fantasy Emerges — Living atop the New Hotel ZaZa: Your Sneak Peek at a Game-Changing Memorial City Tower

Living in a hotel is the type of thing that many people daydream about, but never truly think through. But living on top of a cool chic hotel — in your own luxury apartment, with access to all the perks of hotel life without the downsides — is a whole different story.

This is the life The McCarthy — the new high-rise apartment complex atop the new Hotel ZaZa Memorial City — aims to deliver. This entire 17-story tower (10 levels of hotel, seven levels of high-rise apartments) is something of a sky-high game changer for a section of Houston that only continues to grow.

“It brings a real urban living lifestyle to a part of Houston that’s not used to having that option,” Jason Johnson, the young-looking president of MetroNational, the owner and developer of this new tower as well as the entire 265-acre Memorial City mixed-use kingdom, tells PaperCity.

Johnson spoke to us in a side interview before the first official sneak peek tour of both the new Hotel ZaZa and the accompanying McCarthy. With the hotel scheduled to open on Dec. 1 and The McCarthy shooting to welcome its first residents in February, this showcase project brings plenty of expectations.

A Hotel ZaZa conjures up very distinct images after all — and this new hotel is critical in the brand’s suddenly full-speed-ahead expansion (the long-awaited Hotel ZaZa Austin is under construction and should be open in about 16 months, Z Resorts president Matthew Nuss tells PaperCity).

“We’re famous for the pool scene in our hotels — and this new hotel will be no exception,” Nuss says.

On this day, the pool still needs to be finished, but with the hotel’s hip new restaurant Tipping Point spilling out onto the “Beach Club,” it’s easy to imagine the scene to come. This will become the Steak 48 level see-and-be-seen mecca of Memorial City — and West Houston in general.

The idea behind The McCarthy is that scene always will be right downstairs. Whenever you want it.

This new Hotel ZaZa is right down the road from Memorial City Mall — and it’s possible to walk there without really being exposed to the elements (i.e. stifling summer heat) thanks to the connected buildings along the way. Memorial Hermann Memorial City Medical Center and its sprawling network of hospitals is also walkable.

“You could live here, work here and play here and not need a car most days for sure,” Johnson says.

That’s almost not Houston like — which is exactly the point. It is all about offering a different kind of lifestyle that happens to be outside the loop. City life in the suburbs? Believe it.

The 133 apartments of The McCarthy range from 500 square foot studios where you can jump out of bed and right into the kitchen to 2,000-square-feet-plus two bedrooms.

But the main attraction just may be what’s below.

“Who doesn’t want to live on top of a Hotel ZaZa?” Johnson asks.

The New ZaZa

Hotel ZaZa Memorial City figures to be something of a shopper’s retreat itself. Its standard “doubles” rooms come with two full-sized king beds rather than the typical double beds or queens (if you’re lucky) found in most high-end hotels. Step into this new ZaZa’s Beach House suite — one of eight different specialty suites offered in hotel, another ZaZa touch — and it’s easy to imagine a group of friends using it as their weekend retreat base.

The Beach House suite even comes with a built-in Monopoly board for a little board game pregaming.

“You don’t ever just want to do what’s expected,” Benji Homsey, Z Resorts’ president of brand and development, says.

With that in mind, there are prints from famed British artist David Hockney in the Hotel ZaZa Memorial City hallways. With some original Hockneys going for as much as $12 million, this is another colorful upscale nod for a hotel chain that avoids convention with the same fever that foodies avoid McDonald’s.

Still, the most “out there” thing about this ZaZa may be its ballroom level.

“I think people are going to be surprised by our meeting space,” Nuss says.

Hotel ZaZa Memorial City boasts more than 11,000 square feet of meeting space — with the largest ballroom measuring in at 3,800 square feet. On this sneak peek preview day, a faux wedding was even taking place in the Great Expectations ballroom (another ballroom is called Tiger’s Wife; yes that’s the real name — it’s a ZaZa), complete with a bride in a full stunning wedding dress, a surprisingly nervous-looking groom (it’s not official, guy) and a priest.

Yes, you can say ZaZa has a flair for the dramatic. This is that type of project.