Design
study here, with Becker Olins explaining how her team hired a group of Czech glassmakers to build bespoke sculptures for the hotel.
Above: Accor
emphasises the rich history of the Orient Express through a lavish bedroom suite.
Below: Every room and space within the South Place Hotel has been carefully planned and designed to create a sense of belonging.
81%
of guests that want local experiences when they check in to a hotel. Alice
overriding sense of belonging. “We always start with the concept for the project,” she explains, “and the design of the room or the space. And we usually start by engaging with the art in that space very early on.” The importance of subtlety does not stop there. For that Austin Martin sculpture to feel like it has always belonged over the bar, everything from the location to the lighting to the fittings of pieces must be vigorously planned far in advance. For Becker Olins, trying to distinguish between the art hanging on the wall without considering what lies outside its frame, is basically futile. Instead, she argues for a situation where something as straightforward as the “material on a wall” can become a crucial design element. In practice, that typically means designers and owners must work hard to find precisely the right partners for the job, even if that means searching far from home. Once again, the OWO offers a good case
As far as specific works of art are concerned, what increasingly matters is less the fame or extravagance of a particular piece, and more how it fits into the overall atmosphere. At the South Place Hotel, for instance, all the prints on the walls are taken from artists living within the M25. “It wants to be local,” Norden emphasises. “It wants to be something that has a meaning to the place”. Even more strikingly, many of these paintings were done by students, as opposed to fully-fledged professionals. Apart from saving money overall, Norden adds that this approach allows boutique-level uniqueness even in a hotel with hundreds of rooms. Of course, not even experienced designers could hope to source all this artwork themselves. Rather, Becker Olins explains, Accor – the company behind the recent revival of the Orient Express – liaises with art consultants to find particular appropriate paintings, what Norden characterises as “frameworks” as opposed to hard-and-fast contracts.
Substance over style
Not that landmark artwork is necessarily gone for good. For one thing, both experts agree that a thoughtful investment can not only bring curious guests (and their Instagrams) to a property, it can also help an owner recoup some of their investment should a hotel ultimately have to close its doors.
As Norden puts it: “It will hopefully be there for a very long time to come and be a valuable asset for the client.” The key to this longevity, she continues, is a mantra that she’s repeated across her long career: putting style over fashion. “Fashion is something that’s very much of the moment, something that’s exciting, that changes all the time,” she explains. “For me, style is something much more long term”.
This is a wise distinction. For if the bland, universal design conventions of Hilton have been consigned to history, there is evidence that attitudes are shifting even further. That’s true, for example, when it comes to sustainability. “Art in the future can convey your values,” Becker Olins says, noting the rising concerns around an artist’s use of materials, or how far they ship their masterworks, means a new kind of aesthetic minimalism may become increasingly important. Norden, for her part, comes to similar conclusions, albeit from a slightly different angle. With lobbies increasingly becoming surrogate co-working spots, she advocates for less dramatic, distracting artworks and argues that pieces should probably be ones that “people can work and live and be around”. We may not be returning to a million little Americas, but perhaps to a world where properties are a tad less loud. ●
54 Hotel Management International /
www.hmi-online.com
Conran and Partners; Accor
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57
