The grand opening of the Holiday Inn and Suites and Staybridge Suites took place Friday with the unveiling of a new piece of artwork in front of the building and the re-naming of one of the meeting rooms located on the 9th floor.

The building which is the 1st in Saskatchewan to be home of two hotels in the same building has been open since the spring and one of the meeting rooms in the building was originally called the Cloud 9 Room once the facility was open to the public this spring.

As of Friday the room will be known as “The Evan Thomas Room” named after Evan Thomas who was one of the victims in April’s deadly bus crash involving the Humboldt Broncos.
Evan was the only Bronco from Saskatoon who didn’t survive and his family who came to the city in early April stayed at the hotel. Evan’s dad, Scott says it’s nice knowing that the staff at the hotel have a place in their heart for Evan.

“Our family is so humbled by its….we feel totally undeserving of such an honour… so many things have been done for Evan and our family in his memory and most of those things are in thr sporting world through baseball and hockey.”

U of S President Doctor Peter Stoicheff says the facility will provide service to both residents of Saskatoon and to those studying and working at the U of S…

“It will really serve so many people who want to access many aspects of Saskatoon of course but largely the university. So we have researchers from around the world who come in to stay for significant lengths of time to work at the synchrotron or at VIDO-InterVac.”

The new piece of art titled, “Huskie Proud” can be seen right outside the hotel’s doors and features a large huskie dog which was created by local artist Braden Kiefiuk.