The world's first combination IHOP and Applebee's restaurant will happen next year in downtown Detroit.

The 300-seat gastronomic experiment will be located inside the Millender Center, across from the Renaissance Center, and be oriented to serving guests in nearby hotels as well as downtown visitors, office workers and residents.

Sources said Wednesday that the co-branded restaurant's menu is still being developed, and it's not yet known whether guests could order IHOP pancakes and omelets throughout the day, alongside plates of Applebee's boneless wings and Fiesta Lime Chicken.

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The 12,000-square-foot restaurant would replace the former Sweet Lorraine's café and be a franchise of TEAM Schostak Family Restaurants. It is expected to open in late 2017 and employ more than 100 people. The restaurant will feature a coffee bar and Detroit-centric interior design, executive chairman Mark Schostak said.

"This is the first IHOP/Applebee's combo that’s ever been built anywhere," Schostak said. The Schostak company "is proud to expand our portfolio by uniquely combining two nationally recognized and family-oriented brands."

This IHOP will be the second in Detroit and not affect operations at the existing IHOP restaurant on Jefferson Avenue east of downtown.

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The IHOP and Applebee's chains are owned by Glendale, Calif.-based DineEquity, which was created in 2007 when IHOP bought Applebee's. DineEquity CEO Julia Stewart said in a statement news release Wednesday that the company is excited to have its two brands under the same roof for the first time.

The IHOP/Applebee's co-brand concept, if expanded, might help DineEquity regain growth in the ever-competitive casual dining restaurant business.

Applebee's locations nationwide have seen a modest decline in year-over-year sales figures in recent quarters, while the IHOP brand has seen slower growth amid pressure from the popular All Day Breakfast initiative at McDonalds.

"We've been serving breakfast all day for 58 years," Stewart said earlier this year at the Baird Global Consumer, Technology and Services Conference. "Breakfast was one of the few categories in the restaurant industry that was really growing. So our little secret became everybody else's secret."

The Schostak firm will be leasing the new restaurant space from Riverfront Holdings, a subsidiary of General Motors. Schostak also operates Olga's Kitchen restaurants, several Del Tacos, MOD Pizza and 66 other Applebee's, including the new Applebee's on 8 Mile that opened last year in Detroit's Gateway Marketplace shopping center.

“This offers more selections for people as they can find breakfast, lunch and dinner at a single location when they visit, work or stay in Detroit’s most iconic building,” Claudia Killeen, manager of Renaissance Center development, General Motors Company, said in a news release.

Contact JC Reindl: 313-222-6631 or jcreindl@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter@JCReindl.