INNKEEPERS

Travis, Azie, and their sons (Hunter + Kingston) discovered the "painted village in the sky" known as Tannersville in July 2020. They fell in love with the rustic Adirondack lodge on the peaceful, natural mountaintop. They made it their mission to honor and share the history of Hotel Mountain Brook so its legacy would live on for years to come. 

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Travis is an experienced hotelier with over 20 years in the hotel and leisure industry. He most recently spent five years at Highgate Hotels.  As a result of his success in executing a turnaround effort for over 1,000 New York City rooms owned by DiamondRock Hospitality, he received the 2017 Leadership Award from the publicly traded lodging REIT.

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Prior to Highgate Hotels, Travis was a Managing Director at Centerboard Group, where he co-founded Roughneck Lodging, a temporary workforce lodging company for oil & gas, mining, power and infrastructure projects.

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Before joining Centerboard, his career experience included roles such as the VP of Special Asset Management at TriMont Real Estate Advisors, Vice President in the Real Estate Investment Banking Group at Bank of America, and Director at CNL Hotels & Resorts.  He is known for his love of basketball, his personal take on street style, and his proficiency in creating complex Excel spreadsheet models that dazzle board members. 

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Azie Shelhorse is an interior designer and artist based out of Montclair, NJ.  She is an accomplished interior designer with experience in both hotel and residential spaces. She collaborated on projects with Marriott, Highgate Hotels, Aparium Hotel Group and DiamondRock Hospitality, prior to launching her own boutique hotel collection with Travis in 2019.

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Azie has a creative arts background and her design work has been featured in a number of publications, including Elle Decor, Lodging Magazine, Hotel News Now, InspireDesign, Travel & Leisure, Forbes Magazine, Architectural Digest, Montclair Magazine, and Domino Magazine. She been one of the 70 New York City area designers featured in Housing Works’ Design on a Dime benefit for several years, and has a strong social media following.​ She is best known for her authentic original interiors, her compassion for the community, and her casual zodiac references to explain everything that happens in her life. 

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More important than his extensive hospitality and finance background or her interior design accolades, on Travis' first date with Azie in January 2006, he told her he was going to have his own hotel one day. They were in their late 20s, eating at an Italian restaurant overlooking Lake Fairy in Longwood, Florida. Once he got her attention, he also asked if she would ever consider moving to New York. She promptly canceled her newly minted cabaret contract which would have taken her to Tokyo and far away from him. Six months later, they packed up their lives into a UHaul and drove up the East Coast together to take a chance on love. 

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They opened their storefront {verdigreen} (verdigreen.com), a design-focused indie home furnishings shop and painting studio, in 2010. They had two showroom locations in Montclair and the East Village, NYC, before retiring from retail in 2020 to focus on their growing boutique lodging brand, {verdigreen} hotels. ​​

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Hotel Mountain Brook is their second experiential boutique hotel and they hope you take a moment to breathe it in.  They would love to hear about your stay! 

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To see their first property, check out Twin Gables of Woodstock here. 

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