Hotel Design That Hones

Hotel Design That Hones

Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide introduced the W brand in 1998 to satisfy consumers' growing hunger for accessible style. Since May 2003, Le Meridien has rolled out its Art + Tech concept, a combination of high design and high technology, in six hotels on three continents. In October, InterContinental opened its first Hotel Indigo for midlevel consumers with high-style tastes in Atlanta, and several more properties are set to open over the next year in Chicago, Houston and Sarasota. Luxury chains and developers are taking another tack to keep their customers' interest: labeling hotels with names from the top echelons of fashion. The Ritz-Carlton chain, part of Marriott International, has a Bulgari hotel in Milan, with another soon to follow in Bali, and Emaar Properties of Dubai is planning to open several Armani-branded hotels and resorts in the next few years.
Hotel Q! opened last April on the Knesebeckstrasse in Berlin, around the corner from the buzzing Kurfürstendamm, the city's fashion artery. The hotel's blocky, dark gray exterior belies an interior from not just a different time, but perhaps a different galaxy. In the small lobby of the 72-room hotel, (49-30) 8100-660, www.q-berlin.de, the walls and counters take on folded forms with rounded corners. Ivory, white, black and red predominate, with surfaces often backlighted.
Seven floors up, in a U-shaped studio room, $266, at $1.33 to the euro, a combination angled wall/dropped ceiling separates the center of the room from the entryway and bed area. The gap in the U is taken up by a fully enclosed toilet and by shower stalls. A divan upholstered in cream-colored fake ostrich faces a gigantic flat-screen television. But the pièce de résistance is a single folded surface in mocha veneer that supports a queen bed and, right next to it, a deep soaking tub. A button on the wall nearby heats the slate floor tiles between the bath and twin basins.
Maybe we need a new term for restaurants like 508: “neighborhood-plus.” The economics of West Soho are what they are, but the food here is a lot better than you’d expect for a local place. The restaurant has been open for just over a year, and the owners are now trying to raise its profile, hence the publicist’s invitation to dine here on a recent Friday evening.