HOTEL REVIEW MERCURE EASTGATE MERCURE EASTGATE HOTEL REVIEW
WORDS BY BETHAN RYDER
MERCURE EASTGATE
OXFORD
Design practice Blacksheep have
completed a redesign of the public
areas for the Mercure Eastgate.
xford’s The Mercure Eastgate Hotel has
O
been granted a new lease of life following
the complete reconfiguration and redesign
of its ground floor public areas by London-based
design company Blacksheep. Although more widely
recognised for their club projects, the award-winning
Cuckoo Club, Vendome and Whisky Mist, the duo
behind Blacksheep (husband and wife Tim Mutton
and Jo Sampson) actually cut their design teeth
working for veteran hotel designer Keith Hobbs, the
man behind The Clarence and Metropolitan Hotels,
amongst others. Both Mutton and Sampson worked
at United Designers prior to forming their own
design company in 2002, as their accomplished and
sophisticated scheme for the Mercure attests.
The Eastgate was one of 24 Macdonald Hotels,
acquired by Moorfield Real Estate Fund in early 2000.
With the operational franchise taken up by Mercure,
Accor’s upper mid-market hotel brand, Blacksheep
were commissioned as part of a general upgrade
project for the Macdonald hotel group, with the aim
that the three star Mercure Eastgate Hotel achieve
a four star rating following the refurbishment.
Blacksheep’s redesign, which has an air of the
comfortable home-from-home Firmdale look about
it, encompasses the reception lobby, a new 90-seat
restaurant - The High Table, a lounge, bar and toilet
A
CKSHEEP
areas.
Although the Eastgate Hotel benefits from a corner
location, it occupies a site that has grown organically
since its first 17th-century incarnation as an inn,
resulting in disparate interior architecture of varying
levels. There were no notable existing features to
consider. “The biggest challenge was to reorganise
PHOTOGRAPHY COURTESY OF BL
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