05 June 2024
Holiday Inn returns to Kyoto as IHG Hotels & Resorts and AXA IM Alts sign an agreement to open hotel in Kyoto Gojo by early 2025
- Japan’s first Holiday Inn opened in Kyoto in 1973, so the opening heralds a return to the brand’s roots in Japan
- Holiday Inn Kyoto Gojo will be the eleventh hotel under the Holiday Inn brand family in Japan
- The project is IHG’s second agreement with AXA IM Alts
- With more than 4,300 open worldwide, Holiday Inn is the world’s largest hotel brand family

Tokyo, 5 June, 2024: IHG Hotels & Resorts (IHG) today announced that it has signed a management agreement with AXA IM Alts to open Holiday Inn Kyoto Gojo by early 2025.
The opening heralds the return to the brand’s roots in Japan, with the first Holiday Inn opening more than 50 years ago in 1973. As Holiday Inn returns to Kyoto, it will be Japan’s eleventh hotel under the Holiday Inn brand family and IHG’s third hotel in the city, alongside ANA Crowne Plaza Kyoto and the recently opened Six Senses Kyoto.
The 183-guest room hotel will undergo a comprehensive refurbishment before rebranding as Holiday Inn Kyoto Gojo. Following its reopening, the hotel will feature dining and leisure amenities, including a lobby lounge & café bar, upmarket restaurant, multiple banquet rooms, traditional Japanese daiyokujo baths and gym.
In addition to adding a new open-lobby lounge & café bar and state-of-the-art gym and comprehensive refurbishment of all guest rooms, the renovation works will prioritise improving the energy efficiency of the building, including the installation of energy saving showers, guest room management systems and new facilities. The hotel’s energy conservation will be assessed to obtain BELS certification.
Well-located between Kyoto’s main station and numerous cultural heritage sites and traditional restaurants in downtown Kyoto, the hotel is ideally positioned for visitors arriving via the Shinkansen bullet train. Kyoto’s tourism market has displayed a robust recovery following Japan's reopening of its borders post pandemic, with visitor numbers now surpassing 2019 levels.
Once open, the hotel will further strengthen its efforts to attract guests from Japan and abroad through the power of the world’s best known hotel brand, along with IHG’s global enterprise systems and award-winning loyalty program, IHG One Rewards, with more than 130 million members worldwide.
Abhijay Sandilya, Managing Director of Japan & Micronesia IHG Hotels & Resorts and CEO of IHG-ANA Hotels Group Japan G.K., said, "We are very pleased to announce our agreement with AXA IM Alts to open Holiday Inn Kyoto Gojo by early 2025, marking the return of the brand to its roots in Kyoto where it was first launched back in 1973. The historical, cultural and beautiful Kyoto is one of the world’s favourite destinations, so we are confident that Holiday Inn, as the world’s largest hotel brand family, along with IHG’s other Kyoto hotels, ANA Crowne Plaza Kyoto and Six Senses Kyoto, will provide a place for everyone to stay when visiting this unique and wonderful city. We look forward to building on this long-standing partnership with AXA IM Alts and hope to develop even more great hotels throughout Japan in the years to come."
Laurent Jacquemin, Head of Asia-Pacific at AXA IM Alts, commented: “The fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic provided a compelling entry point for new acquisitions in certain pockets of the hospitality sector. The sector’s favorable structural drivers, including an increase in domestic and international tourism, underpin this highly attractive investment. We have long track record of successfully executing value-add projects as we look to reposition this sizeable, well-located hotel in a market characterized by a scarcity of foreign-brand hotels.
Japan is a key global market for AXA IM Alts, and one where we will look to pursue our deployment in 2024, targeting those sectors benefitting from supportive technological, urbanisation and demographic trends.”
IHG continues to embed its position as one of Japan’s leading international hotel companies, which currently has 59 open and pipeline hotels across the country and is experiencing its biggest period of growth on record in Japan.
Overview of Holiday Inn Kyoto Gojo
Name: |
Holiday Inn Kyoto Gojo |
Scheduled opening: |
Early 2025 (refurbished) |
Contract: |
Management contract between IHG-ANA Hotels Group Japan, GK and AXA IM Alts |
Location: |
179 Higashikazariyachō, Shimogyo-ku, Kyoto, Kyoto, Japan |
Total floor space: |
8,099 m2 |
Number of guest rooms: |
183 hotel rooms |
Hotel facilities: |
Lobby lounge, café bar, restaurant, banquet rooms, gym, traditional Japanese bathhouse facilities and parking |
Access: |
2-minute walk from Gojo Station, 5 minutes by taxi from JR Kyoto Station, and 20 minutes from Kyoto Higashi exit of the Meishin Expressway. |
Ends
For further information please contact:
Lisa Sakaguchi
Senior Manager, Corporate Affairs Japan & Micronesia
[email protected]
+81 80 7670 1476
About IHG®
IHG Hotels & Resorts [LON:IHG, NYSE:IHG (ADRs)] is a global hospitality company, with a purpose to provide True Hospitality for Good.
With a family of 19 hotel brands and IHG One Rewards, one of the world's largest hotel loyalty programmes, IHG has over 6,300 open hotels in more than 100 countries, and a development pipeline of over 2,000 properties.
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About the Holiday Inn Brand
Whether it’s with friends, family or co-workers, Holiday Inn makes it easy for travellers to be there together for any moment, big or small. With thousands of locations around the world, Holiday Inn hotels deliver memorable experiences for business and leisure travellers through warm and welcoming service, contemporary design that blends the familiar with the new, and a sense of comfort unique to the brand and its iconic green sign. At Holiday Inn hotels, guests can find amenities to help them make connections, work and play, including full-service restaurants where Kids Eat Free, meeting and business facilities, bright swimming pools and flexible public spaces. For more information about the Holiday Inn brand, visit www.holidayinn.com