"It's going to be approachable, but done in a very sophisticated way." That's how Jason Romair, the developer behind Kaiya Beach Resort, described the restaurant going in next to Omaire Gallery, in a March 2026 conversation with nola.com. For two years, that restaurant existed only as a line item in future plans. Now it has a name, a chef pedigree, and a construction schedule.
If you've owned or rented at Kaiya since it opened in 2024, you know the pattern by now. Every amenity page on the resort's own site carries some version of the same disclaimer: coming soon, opening date to be announced. This spring, one of those blanks finally got filled in, and the number attached to it is bigger than what was originally on the table.
The suite count that grew
Kaiya's own materials for Oyom Hotel & Spa, the resort's hospitality anchor, describe a 30-suite property. That's still the figure on the resort's official Oyom page as of this writing, alongside the line "opening date to be announced."
The March 2026 nola.com feature, built on a direct interview with Romair, put the number at 40 suites, plus a 4,000-square-foot spa and fitness center. Ten additional suites and a spa large enough to stand on its own as a wellness destination is not a rounding error between two versions of a brochure. It's a sign the project's hospitality footprint grew somewhere between the early renderings and what's actually being built this year.
For anyone already living at Kaiya, that shift matters in two practical ways. A larger Oyom means more daily foot traffic and more staff moving through the property once it opens, on top of the 173 residences already spread across the resort's 32 acres. It also means a bigger commercial anchor supporting the community's vacation rental program, which tends to firm up nightly rates for owners who participate in it. Neither of those effects shows up until the doors open, but the scope decision has already been made.
A name, a chef pedigree, and a floor plan
For most of Kaiya's short history, "a restaurant is coming" was the entire sentence. As of this spring, it has a name: Lamuse D'Or, going in next to Omaire Gallery. According to the nola.com reporting, the project is a partnership between Kaiya and Chicago's Boka Restaurant Group, working with Donnie Madia of One Off Hospitality, both carrying Michelin credentials from their prior work.
Romair described the menu as Gulf-inspired, with plates comparable to what you'd find in New York or Paris, though he declined to pin down a specific cuisine label. The interior is planned around white terrazzo floors and Calacatta viola marble, with artwork woven through the space, consistent with the gallery-adjacent setting.
"It's going to be approachable, but done in a very sophisticated way."
That's a specific enough description to plan around, even without a firm opening date. For an owner deciding whether to book a summer rental cycle or hold out for a fall visit, knowing the restaurant exists, who's behind it, and roughly what it will feel like is more useful than another year of "coming soon."
What's actually open right now
The amenity rollout at Kaiya has always been staged, and it's worth separating what you can walk into today from what's still a construction site.
Open now:
- Thisday Café, the resort's all-day café, serving coffee and pastries in the morning and smoothies and light fare through the rest of the day.
- Omaire Gallery, showing contemporary classicism work, from paintings to marble sculpture. Creative director Terry Slaughter has described the space as closer to a museum than a retail gallery, calling it "large" and "very minimalist," with a stated goal of giving visitors an experience rather than a sales pitch.
- Kaiya Beach House, with its 250 feet of private, serviced beach, an infinity pool, and lounge, available through Kaiya Club membership.
- Strand Villas, the resort's flagship Gulf-front residential collection, which is under active construction alongside the hospitality buildout.
Still coming:
- Oyom Hotel & Spa, the 40-suite property with the 4,000-square-foot spa and fitness center, under construction with no confirmed opening date.
- Lamuse D'Or, named and staffed with its culinary partners, but not yet open.
- An on-site fitness center. Kaiya's own FAQ currently notes that yoga sessions and private training are arranged through concierge rather than a standing gym, which tells you the fitness piece of Oyom hasn't caught up to the marketing copy yet either.
Read together, that split tells its own story. The parts of Kaiya that were always meant to feel residential, the café, the gallery, the beach club, have been running since the resort opened. The parts that require a general contractor are still catching up to the vision, and this year is when they stopped being renderings and started being schedules.
Why the timeline is the real update
It's tempting to read all of this as simply "more amenities are coming," but the more useful read is about sequencing. Kaiya opened in 2024 after roughly five years of construction, and Romair has been public about wanting the project to feel like a deliberate alternative to the busier stretches of the Gulf Coast, telling nola.com the goal was something "low-density and not crowded." The same reporting notes that tourism along the coast has kept climbing since the pandemic, and that growth has made some residents and local officials in the broader region more cautious about new commercial development and the traffic that comes with it.
None of that is a claim about Kaiya specifically causing congestion. It's context for why a hospitality anchor the size of a 40-suite hotel and a Michelin-adjacent restaurant doesn't just slot in overnight, and why the resort's own site still hedges on a date. If you're living at Kaiya through this construction phase, the practical takeaway is to expect activity on-site through the rest of 2026 without a guaranteed date for when Oyom and Lamuse D'Or actually open their doors.
If you're further along in a decision about buying into one of Kaiya's remaining collections, the same phased-rollout dynamic is worth understanding at the contract level, not just the amenity level. We've laid out how that plays out in the pre-construction purchase process at Kaiya, including what Florida's condominium disclosure rules require developers to share before you're under binding contract.
The short version
Kaiya spent its first two years selling a vision that was mostly still on paper. This spring, that vision picked up a chef, a floor plan, and a suite count that's larger than what was originally described, alongside a café, a gallery, and a beach club that have quietly been running the whole time. The hotel and the restaurant still don't have opening dates. But for the first time since 2024, "coming soon" comes with enough specifics to actually plan around.
If you're weighing what this build-out means for a purchase, a sale, or simply understanding what your property at Kaiya will be worth once Oyom and Lamuse D'Or open their doors, Diana Kish has been tracking 30A's resort communities long enough to read a construction timeline the way a buyer or seller needs it read. Request a complimentary market consultation and get a straight answer on where Kaiya stands today.
