EVENTS
the hotel industry’s current figures, future trends and investment opportunities. One session saw panelists from leading hotel groups and design practices discuss developments in guestroom design. Rob Wagemans, Principal at Concrete revealed: “We are eliminating the bathroom, merging it with the bedroom so it becomes a studio space.” But Tassilo Bost, Principal at Bost Design argued that the bathroom needs some element of privacy to correspond with how people live their lives in the home. With hotels being stripped back to the essentials in properties where space is at a premium, it was questioned whether small rooms could really be classed as luxury. Jane Lawrence, Director, Conran & Partners, believed that “to be real five-star you need space and singular functionality.” However Wagemans argued that luxury was time achieved through clever and efficient design, as with Concrete’s award-winning 14m2 guestrooms for CitizenM. He also referred to his recent designs for W London Leicester Square as an example of a five-star guestroom that makes the best use of its space. As the
smallest in the W Hotels portfolio, the rooms feel larger than their 28m2
through the
development of dual-purpose furniture, for example a vanity unit that merges with the work desk.
InterContinental’s Vice President of Global Brand Standards, Simon Ford, agreed that space is luxury but stressed there was some pressure to fit more guestrooms into a property. One solution discussed was to turn a hotel’s public areas into an extension of the living space enabling the guestroom to become a purely functional space. The use of technology was also listed as a way to give space back to a room, although Ford cautioned that in a brand with as many rooms as IHG, introducing technology into one property meant that guests would expect the same facilities in every IHG property. Insightful thoughts on the future of the hotel guestroom revealed the possibility of personalisation, and the transition between a house, a short-stay property, and a hotel. A later session focusing on food and
beverage design in the hospitality arena welcomed to the stage Robbie Bargh, Founder
088 JANUARY / FEBRUARY 2012
WWW.SLEEPERMAGAZINE.COM
and Creative Director of Gorgeous Group, Tim Mutton, co-founder and Managing Director of Blacksheep, Erik Nissen Johansen, founder and Creative Director of Stylt Trampoli, and Peter Prescott, Managing Director of Prescott & Conran. The lively panel discussed operational concerns facing the restaurant designer, and the importance of storytelling through design. “To make a restaurant worthwhile and get value for money, you have to create a feeling of being away from every day life,” explained Johansen. “Not just storytelling, but a script.” The designers also put emphasis on the
operators, saying that a restaurant can’t be a success if the food and service are bad, regardless of the design. An exclusive interview with Patrick Reardon, Executive Chairman of Reardon Smith, offered an insight into the creative mind behind this year’s European Hotel Design Award winner. From his early days working behind a hotel reception desk, Reardon has gone on to design a plethora of hotels, perhaps the most ambitious being the £220m reconstruction of The Savoy.
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