When The Hacienda at Georgetown opens near Austin, TX, in early 2023, the amenities on the 13-acre campus will include fine-dining meals prepared by celebrity chef Stephan Pyles.
Among the five dining options at the resort-style community will be an outward-facing restaurant called Alma, which means “soul” in Spanish.
Pyles told the McKnight’s Business Daily that he selected the name to reflect the restaurant as the soul of the community. The dining venue will be open to the public as well as people who call The Hacienda home.
“We call them ‘members,’ not ‘residents,’” Executive Director Annika DiNovi said. Those members will get first dibs on reservations at Alma.
DiNovi said the surrounding population already is familiar with Pyles’ restaurants. The chef has operated 23 dining establishments in six cities across Texas over the past 32 years, he said. He exited restaurant ownership early in 2020, just before the pandemic started, to focus more time on the consultancies with which he was involved, Pyles said.
Alma will feature what Pyles calls New Texas, or Texas hill country, cuisine.
“Southwestern cuisine is the only regional cuisine that was created by chefs,” the James Beard Award winner said, adding that it’s a blend of Native American, African, Mexican and cowboy range cooking influences.
“The tagline for Alma is sort of ‘hill country soul food,’” Pyles said.
DiNovi said the luxury community has 90 members signed up so farto call the Hacienda at Georgetown their home when it opens in early 2023. Signups for independent living have been strong, she said, and assisted living and memory care are “coming along.” The community does not offer skilled nursing.
In addition to the restaurants, The Hacienda at Georgetown will have a fitness center, spa and salon, virtual reality program and a performance pavilion for concerts and other programming.
The Watermark Retirement Communities-managed property “feels like a resort when you walk through the doors,” DiNovi said. “Everything is an elevated approach to senior living.”
DiNovi said that executives are working on an agreement with Texas A&M University to partner on a nursing internship program possibly beginning in the spring. The Hacienda at Georgetown will look for opportunities to partner with other Texas universities as well, she added.
Georgetown is the fastest-growing city in the United States among cities with populations of more than 50,000, according to data released in May by the Census Bureau. That growth is one reason that Alma and its celebrity chef will draw multiple generations, DiNovi said.
