The new Daxton Hotel is joining the Hilton family.

Downtown Birmingham’s 151-room hotel at South Old Woodward Avenue and Brown Street will officially become the Daxton Hotel Birmingham, Curio Collection by Hilton this fall.

Mark Mitchell, an entrepreneur whose family owns the roughly 3-year-old hotel, said in an interview Tuesday afternoon that the change is expected to take place Oct. 1. Hilton’s website also reflects the upcoming change.

Mitchell said joining the Hilton hotel empire will give guests access to rewards points and make the Daxton more visible to millions of people who stay with the chain every year. 

McLean, Va.-based Hilton Worldwide Holdings Inc.’s (NYSE: HLT) website says it has close to 7,800 hotels across 24 brands with more than 1.2 million rooms in 126 countries and territories. 

“We think it very much opens up the exposure of the Daxton to all Hilton travels, whereas before you would have to be in town to see us,” Mitchell said.

Joining the Curio Collection also allows the Daxton to retain its brand identity, Mitchell said. 

That could be expanding, if he has his way. 

Mitchell said he’s exploring opening Daxton-branded hotels in other areas, including major travel destinations like South Florida and Manhattan. Those other areas do not include Southeast Michigan, as he plans to limit the expansion, if it happens, to one Daxton hotel per market.

In another change, the Bacall brothers’ Birmingham-based Superior Hospitality Group LLC hotel management and ownership company has taken over operations at the Daxton. That move took place earlier this summer, Mitchell said. 

Superior has about 8,000 hotel rooms across about 60 hotels in four states. Superior’s parent company, Birmingham-based Bacall Companies LLC, has about 2.5 million square feet of retail and office space in its portfolio, as well as 18 restaurants. 

The Curio Collection is part of Hilton’s lifestyle brand vertical, billed on the hotel chain’s website as properties with “distinctive architecture and design, world-class food and beverage, and curated experiences.”

The new Godfrey Detroit hotel in the city’s Corktown neighborhood is also a Curio Collection property, as is the Amway Grand Plaza hotel in downtown Grand Rapids.

Brandon Leversee, a Royal Oak-based director for HVS Inc., a hospitality research company based in Tennessee, said the Daxton should benefit from the switch to a national franchise.

“Curio seems like a logical choice for the Daxton, allowing ownership to maintain the hotel’s originality and luxury product while benefitting from Hilton’s guest loyalty program,” Leversee said.

HVS says that last year, Curio Collection’s 79 hotels (18,667 rooms) had an average occupancy rate of 69.8%, with average daily rates of $229.69 and average revenue per available room — RevPAR in industry-speak, a key financial metric in the hotel realm — of $160.42.

The $60 million Daxton, owned by the Woodward Brown Ventures LLC ownership group controlled by Mitchell, opened in 2021. 

It was originally managed by Chicago-based Aparium Hotel Group, but Woodward Brown took over management less than a year after the hotel began taking its first guests. Woodward Brown then shifted management to Superior Hospitality Group within the last couple months. 

The Daxton Hotel’s arrival on the downtown Birmingham hotel scene pitted it squarely against the mainstay Townsend Hotel on Townsend Street, long a destination for professional athletes, entertainers and other celebrities staying in the region.