Why an Ohio Apartment Community is a Finalist in the World’s Most Prestigious Hospitality Design Awards
There’s a reason we don’t describe what we do with multifamily clients as “apartment design.”
What Crimson does — and what we did at The Langham in Columbus — is hospitality design. We just happen to deliver it inside multifamily communities. And now one of the most respected organizations in the hospitality world agrees.
We’re proud to announce that Crimson Design Group has been named a finalist in the 22nd Annual HD Awards, presented by Hospitality Design magazine. Our work on The Langham, a multifamily community in the Grandview Heights neighborhood of Columbus, Ohio, earned recognition alongside some of the most celebrated hotel and resort projects in the world.
This one is personal to us because The Langham was developed by Preferred Living, a client we’ve worked alongside for more than 20 years. We’re heading to Las Vegas together in May to celebrate, and that feels exactly right.
Winners are announced on May 5th, 2026 at HD Expo + Conference in Las Vegas and all finalists will be featured in the magazine’s May/June 2026 issue.
About the HD Awards
The HD Awards aren’t a local honor or a trade show participation ribbon. They’re widely considered the most prestigious recognition in the global hospitality design industry.
This year, two dedicated panels of judges — including creative directors from Hilton, Sage Hospitality, Wimberly Interiors, and Design Hotels — evaluated more than 1,000 entries across 34 project and 15 product categories. Being selected as a finalist means The Langham was recognized as among the best and most innovative design work in the world. We are very proud of this recognition for our clients and partners who helped bring the vision to life.
For a Columbus-based interior design firm whose work lives in the multifamily space, earning a spot alongside international luxury hotels isn’t just a proud moment, it’s confirmation of something we continually see: evidence that residents don’t think in categories. They know a great space when they walk into one, whether it’s a Four Seasons or their apartment lobby. The developers winning in today’s leasing market figured that out first.
The Project: The Langham, Columbus, Ohio
The Langham is an urban multifamily community in Grandview Heights — one of Columbus’s most competitive leasing markets. When Preferred Living brought us in, the goal wasn’t just to fill amenity square footage. It was to design a place where residents would genuinely want to spend time.
We approached it the way we’d approach a boutique hotel: we thought about arrival, movement, atmosphere, and memory. What does it feel like to walk in? What draws people upstairs? What would make them text a friend and say you have to come see this place?
The result was a layered amenity experience that runs across multiple floors without feeling repetitive. A custom lobby desk anchored in patterned tile and paneled detailing sets the tone from the moment you walk in. A commissioned LED artwork by a local Ohio artist gives the space an unexpected sense of place. A two-story green-paneled staircase doubles as both circulation and sculptural centerpiece, enough so that it doesn’t just connect floors, it invites exploration.
Resident-facing spaces were planned around how people actually live: a 24-hour fitness center with Peloton equipment, refined conference rooms for work-from-home days, Starbucks beverage stations, a private theater, retro arcade, and virtual golf simulators. Outdoors, the pool terrace was designed as a full-service resort experience — temperature-controlled water, bespoke cabanas, integrated hydrotherapy. A space that begs you to stay and relax.
Residents noticed. Online reviews consistently call the community “luxurious,” reference the quality of the shared spaces by name, and describe Langham as feeling more like a destination than an apartment. Those aren’t words from a marketing team, they’re direct quotes from five-star Google reviews by residents.
In 2025, The Langham also won the ASID Design Excellence Award for Commercial Space, Large in the Ohio/Kentucky chapter show.Â
Twenty Years in the Making
Great design doesn’t happen in a vacuum. The Langham is also the story of what’s possible when a developer and a design firm have two decades of trust behind them.
Preferred Living has been a Crimson client for more than 20 years. In that time, we’ve developed a shared language around quality, around what residents respond to, and around the kind of communities that hold their value long after the ribbon cutting. That depth of relationship shows up in the work. When a developer trusts you to take creative risks, you can design something truly worth celebrating.
We’re proud of The Langham. We’re proud of this recognition. And we’re especially proud to be walking into that awards ceremony in Las Vegas with the people who made it possible.
What This Means If You’re a Multifamily Developer
Being measured against world-class hotel and resort projects — and making the cut — validates something we’ve been designing toward for years: the amenity spaces in your community are a competitive asset, not a line item.
Residents today aren’t just renting square footage. They’re choosing an experience. A community that feels like a luxury hotel commands premium rents, holds them longer, and generates the kind of word-of-mouth that no marketing budget can replicate. The Langham’s leasing performance and resident reviews are proof of concept.
That’s what hospitality-informed multifamily design delivers, and it’s why developers who invest in it early are the ones setting market benchmarks in their submarkets, not chasing them.
Hospitality Thinking for Commercial and Multifamily Design
For over two decades, Crimson Design Group has worked across residential, multifamily, and commercial spaces with a consistent point of view: design should do something. It should make a space feel alive, draw people in, and hold up over time — visually, physically, and experientially.
The HD Awards recognition for The Langham reflects that philosophy at its best: a multifamily community designed with the same intention, detail, and hospitality instinct you’d find in a five-star hotel, and delivered for a market that’s hungry for exactly that.
If you’re planning a multifamily development, a clubhouse refresh, or a full amenity build-out and want a partner who’s been recognized among the world’s best in hospitality design, we’d love to talk.
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