Luxury Hotels Atlas / Places / United States / Orlando / JW Marriott Orlando Grande Lakes
JW Marriott Orlando Grande Lakes
Orlando, Florida, United States · JW Marriott · Core Luxury
JW Marriott Orlando, Grande Lakes and its next-door twin, The Ritz-Carlton Orlando, Grande Lakes, share a 500-acre campus built at the literal headwaters of the Everglades, where Shingle Creek starts its run south. Smallwood Architects gave the JW's 25-story tower a Moorish Spanish look, while the Ritz-Carlton next door drew from Mizner architecture and Tuscany, and guests of either hotel can use both towers' combined 1,500 rooms, 12 restaurants, and three-story, 40-treatment-room spa.
- 998 rooms
- Opened 2003
- Neighborhood: Grande Lakes
- Rooms from 425 sq ft (39 m²)
- Architect: Smallwood Architects
About JW Marriott Orlando Grande Lakes
- The campus's Greg Norman-designed golf course is the permanent home of the PNC Championship, the PGA Tour Champions' parent-child tournament.
- Whisper Creek Farm, a working organic farm on the property, supplies produce directly to the resort's restaurants.
- At 998 rooms across 26 floors, the JW Marriott tower alone holds more rooms than most freestanding Orlando luxury hotels.
- The two hotels' shared 150,000 square feet of event space makes the campus Central Florida's largest Marriott convention resort.
History
The 500 acres at the headwaters of the Florida Everglades, where Shingle Creek flows southward through the flatlands between Orlando International Airport and the Orange County Convention Center, were selected in the late 1990s for a resort development unlike anything previously attempted in Central Florida. The site's ecological character — surrounded by natural Florida landscape, tranquil lakes, and a working organic farm — offered a counterintuitive proposition in a theme-park-dominated market: luxury hospitality grounded in the genuine natural heritage of the Florida landscape rather than in manufactured environments.
The Grande Lakes resort opened on June 27, 2003, as a twin-property campus housing both the JW Marriott Orlando, Grande Lakes and The Ritz-Carlton Orlando, Grande Lakes in adjacent towers. Smallwood Architects designed the JW Marriott tower — 25 stories and nearly one million square feet of building — with a Moorish Spanish architectural vocabulary that drew explicit inspiration from the opulent hotel culture of historical Florida, while The Ritz-Carlton drew from Mizner architecture and classical Tuscany. The two properties shared infrastructure including the 18-hole championship golf course designed by Greg Norman, which opened in 2003 and became the permanent home of the PNC Championship parent-child golf tournament. Guests of either hotel could access the amenities of the other, creating a resort campus with a combined offering of more than 1,500 rooms, 12 restaurants, a three-story spa with 40 treatment rooms, multiple pools, a lazy river, and the largest meeting space in the Marriott portfolio for Central Florida.
The JW Marriott's 998 rooms spread across 26 floors, its Italian restaurant, sushi restaurant, cafes, lobby lounge, poolside bar and grill, and Starbucks gave it the comprehensive dining infrastructure of a self-contained destination resort. The par-72 golf course, 48 meeting rooms, and 150,000 square feet of event space positioned it as Central Florida's flagship convention resort. A Grande Lakes Waterpark, added in a subsequent expansion, gave the JW Marriott campus a family-oriented aquatic element that the Ritz-Carlton shared with the neighboring property.
Fourteen miles from Disney Springs and nine miles from Universal Studios, the hotel sits far enough from the theme-park corridor to maintain genuine resort identity while remaining easily accessible. The AAA Four Diamond property has for two decades offered the particular proposition of a luxury resort that makes its natural Florida setting — the headwaters, the ecological preserve, the working farm — as central to the guest experience as its proximity to the world's most visited entertainment complex.
The setting
JW Marriott Orlando Grande Lakes co-anchors the 600-acre Grande Lakes campus on Central Florida Parkway alongside its companion luxury property, sharing a Greg Norman-designed championship golf course, a 42,000-square-foot spa, and Whisper Creek Farm, which supplies the resort's farm-to-table restaurants. Designed by Smallwood Architects in a Moorish Spanish tradition evoking opulent Floridian resort heritage, the property sits just five minutes from the Orange County Convention Center, 39 minutes from Universal Epic Universe, and about 44 minutes from Gatorland, positioning it as Orlando's most strategically central luxury address for both convention travelers and theme park visitors. 8.9 miles from Wizarding World of Harry Potter.
Restaurants and bars
- EvrBar — Bar · Bar
- Primo — Restaurant
- Whisper Creek Farm: The Kitchen — Restaurant · American
- Citron, An American Brasserie — Restaurant · American
Amenities
- Spa
- Pool
- Sauna
- Hot tub
- Fitness center
- Tennis
- Golf course
- Pet-friendly
Awards
- AAA Four Diamond (2026)
- Forbes Travel Guide Four-Star (2026)
Open JW Marriott Orlando Grande Lakes in the atlas for live weekend rates, photos, and the full folio.
More JW Marriott hotels
- JW Marriott Austin — Austin, United States · Core Luxury
- JW Marriott Charlotte — Charlotte, United States · Core Luxury
- JW Marriott Chicago — Chicago, United States · Core Luxury
- JW Marriott Clearwater Beach Resort & Spa — Clearwater, United States · Core Luxury
- JW Marriott Dallas Arts District — Dallas, United States · Core Luxury
- JW Marriott Grand Rapids — Grand Rapids, United States · Core Luxury
More hotels in Orlando
- Grand Hyatt Orlando — Grand Hyatt · Core Luxury
- JW Marriott Orlando Bonnet Creek Resort & Spa — JW Marriott · Core Luxury
- Lake Nona Wave Hotel — Autograph Collection · Core Luxury
- Conrad Orlando at Evermore — Conrad · High Luxury
- Waldorf Astoria Orlando - An Official Walt Disney World® Hotel — Waldorf Astoria · High Luxury
- Arnold Palmer's Bay Hill Club & Lodge — Independent · Accessible Luxury
JW Marriott in The Maison: the brand's idea, history and every house on the atlas.