Starting with London — where an extraordinary amount of development is going on — the owners of Cliveden in Berkshire and the Royal Crescent Hotel in Bath are opening Hotel Verta (hotelverta.com) in Battersea at the London Heliport (the main helicopter port in the city) next spring.
The Verta, they say, will be the “first integrated hotel helicopter solution in the world”, with 70 bedrooms and rates for high-flyers from £293. Across the river in Marylebone, The Arch London (www.thearchlondon.com) will be a stylish 82-room property spread across seven Georgian houses and two mews cottages on Great Cumberland Place opening next month. It will have a bar, a restaurant serving traditional British food, and bright rooms, with B&B rates from £230.
Perhaps the most prominent London opening will be the W Hotel in Leicester Square (whotels.com). This large glass structure will open in late summer on the spot where the Swiss Centre used to be, with 190 B&B rooms and rates from an eye-watering £316. But this will be a titch compared with the Park Plaza Westminster Bridge (parkplazahotels.net), opening early in the year. With 1,021 designer rooms (from £146), restaurants, bars, a spa and swimming pool, this will be the biggest new-build in the capital for years.
For something a little different, St John restaurant (stjohn restaurant.co.uk), known for its meat-based menus, is opening a restaurant with 15 rooms just off Leicester Square in Chinatown in summer (doubles £200). And then, of course, there is the re-opening in April of The Savoy on the Strand (fairmont.com), which has been extensively renovated with Edwardian and Art Deco features left in place. Rooms from £350.
Outside the capital, York will get its first five-star hotel when Cedar Court Grand (cedarcourthotels.co.uk) opens in spring in a Grade II listed Edwardian building that was once the headquarters of the North Eastern Railway Company. It will have 107 rooms and a spa, with opulent bedrooms decorated in warm colours (from £150).
Meanwhile, ABode Chester (abodehotels.co.uk) is a new-build on the site of the former Cheshire Constabulary headquarters. It will open in April with stylish rooms, sweeping views of Chester and the Welsh hills, BarMC (a late-night lounge bar), and a restaurant with a menu by the chef Michael Caines. Rooms from £79.
Saints Newcastle (saintshotels.com) will open its doors in the new year in a Georgian townhouse close to the main station — with 11 boutique suites, a wine bar and a bistro serving local produce (from £225). Down near Ascot, Coworth Park (dorchestercollection.com) will be a new country house hotel opening in July, on 240 acres of Royal Berkshire parkland with 70 rooms, two restaurants and an “eco-luxury spa”.
In Weybridge, Surrey, Brooklands Hotel is due to open in spring next to Mercedes-Benz World, with the original Brooklands racing track running through the reception. There will be 128 bedrooms decorated in rich leathers, with a 1930s racing theme — plus a spa.
There is lots of activity in Glasgow with Blythswood Square, a plush, five-star hotel (townhousecompany.com) just open on the site of the former home of the Royal Scottish Automobile Club (doubles £180).
For something a bit funkier, try the new Lorne Hotel (lornehotelglasgow.co.uk), a boutique property with modern rooms with clean lines and an Indian restaurant (doubles from £75), or Hotel Indigo (hotel indigo.com), which is in a converted bank building on Waterloo Street with stylish rooms and rates from £125. In Northern Ireland, the big hotel news of the year is a £16 million extension to the five-star Merchant Hotel (themerchanthotel.com) in Belfast, with 38 new rooms, a spa, a rooftop gym and a jazz bar. Rooms from £140; opens in the summer.
Europe
After the celebrations of the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, there are several openings in Germany’s capital, including Soho House Berlin (sohohouse.com), run by the UK private members club, coming in the spring in the Mitte district. There will be six floors, a rooftop pool, a spa and a cinema. Rooms from about £100. There is also an H2 Hotel (h2hotels.com) arriving in Alexander Platz, offering smart “inexpensive but not cheap” three-star rooms — rates not set yet — and Tryp Berlin Mitte, another smart modern hotel (no website as yet) due to open in autumn on the former site of the East German Department of Health.
Budapest is another busy capital in 2010. The five-star Baglioni Hotel (baglioni hotels.com) is opening in Buda park with 66 elegant, traditionally decorated rooms and access to the next door Ràcz thermal spa. For something a bit wilder there is the Buddha-Bar Hotel Klorild Palace (buddhabarhotelbudapest.com), which will have a restaurant serving Asian dishes, overlooked by a giant Buddha. Bedrooms are flamboyant and plush (from £360). Much cheaper, the four-star Hotel Nemetzi (accorhotels.com) will be filled with contemporary Hungarian art, opening in March; rooms from £95.
In Puglia, Italy, the Borgo Egnazia (borgoegnazia.com) will overlook the Adriatic. It looks very classy: slick minimalist rooms, angular limestone buildings constructed with local stone, and a swanky spa (suites £380). Villa Armena in Tuscany (villaarmena.com, essentiallyitaly.co.uk), a Renaissance villa dating from the late 1400s and 16 miles (20km) from Siena, is being turned into a ten-bedroom hotel with stylish rooms, opening in September. Beautiful gardens and a large pool (B&B doubles £230).
The Kresten Royal in Rhodes, Greece (thekrestenroyal.gr) opens in April on a clifftop and from the pictures on its website it looks incredibly high-tech and futuristic, with a slick grey interior and cube-shaped designs (B&B doubles £125). From May in the Peloponnese, The Romanos in Costa Navarino will overlook the Ionian Sea. Rooms are modern and minimalist without losing “warmth” (doubles from £380). Beautiful beaches near by.
Long-haul
As Dubai’s economy wilts in the sun, its neighbour Abu Dhabi is in the midst of a hotel frenzy. In June, a Rocco Forte hotel (roccofortecollection.com) opens with rooms designed by Olga Polizzi, a Mark Hix restaurant and a spa in an 11-storey tower close to a huge shopping centre and the Abu Dhabi Golf Club (doubles £175).
A smart Aloft Hotel, run by the Starwood group (aloftabudhabi.com), is also due in the new year (rooms £112), but perhaps the most unusual new development is the Yas Hotel (theyashotel.com). This is in a building that looks like two giant flying saucers, with 499 rooms, 14 bars and restaurants, and a Formula One track that runs right under the hotel. The penthouse, with a private lift, consists of 28 bedrooms and covers 2,531 sq m. The penthouse is £3,273 a night, with doubles a more modest £163.
In the Caribbean, Nonsuch Bay in Antigua (nonsuchbayresort.com) has rooms with a clean, fresh feel, plain wooden floors, shutters and elegant white furnishings. There are infinity pools, sweeping views and double rooms from a reasonable £850 a week for two people. In Saint Lucia, Hotel Chocolat (hotelchocolat.co.uk), the chocolate-making company, is opening a non-chocolate hotel on a working cocoa plantation in March. The hotel, with views of the Pitons peaks, will have six rooms (rates not set). The Viceroy (viceroyanguilla.com) on Anguilla claims to be the “most exciting opening in the Caribbean this year” and consists of 166 rooms in muted colours in a resort on a pristine beach. There are infinity pools, cocktail bars with DJs, children’s clubs, five restaurants and a spa.
Among the many openings in India, Taj Hotel’s Falaknuma Palace in Hyderabad (tajhotels.com) stands out — an 1893 palace full of chandeliers, walnut antiques and gold and crystal tables. Rooms booked per night are a staggering £449, but less costly deals are available as packages through Indiaportfolio.co.uk.
In the Seychelles, Constance Ephelia Resort (epheliaresort.com) opens in the new year on Mahé with elegant villas with private plunge pools and five restaurants. A week’s half-board, if booked before the end of the year, is £1,249pp from Seychelleselite.co.uk.
In Africa, Coral Lodge 15.41 in Mozambique (corallodge1541.com) is a boutique beach retreat in a remote mangrove forest with “Evening Breeze” eco-beds that somehow provide cool air naturally without air-conditioning. It is a ten-minute motor-boat to Ilha de Moçambique, the former Portuguese capital of Eastern Africa. Rooms from £220pp per night (all meals and drinks included), but packages available from www.imagineafrica.co.uk.
Another dream opening is the Banyan Tree Ungasan in Bali (www.banyantree.com), close to the Pura Luhur Uluwatu temple and with a terrific spa and rooms with plunge pools. Tropical-locations.com has a week from £2,129, including UK flights. Amanfayun in China (amanresorts.com) will open next month in a rural setting outside Hangzhou. It will have a swanky spa, “original village dwelling”-style rooms with Chinese lattice screens, iPod stations and daybeds — plus a cigar room, a DVD library and excursions to Buddhist temples. From £200 a night. Mai Samui on Koh Samui in Thailand (maisamui.com) has plush modern rooms in an oriental style, Thai cooking lessons and a large spa — from £125 a night.
In the US, London is coming to Miami at Soho Beach House Miami (sohohouse.com), with 44 rooms and a private members’ club in the style of the original Soho House. There will be a large pool, and a Cecconi’s restaurant and, like their other new opening in Berlin, a private cinema and Cowshed spa (doubles from £125).
Opening in April in New York, Andaz Fifth Avenue (andaz.com) will be a chic hotel with a funky cocktail bar and minimalist rooms (Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher are Andaz fans), with rooms from £165; while in Australia, if many of these hotels seem a bit pricey, the just-opened YHA Sydney Harbour (yha.com.au) is a few steps from Circular Quay with a huge roof terrace, fantastic views and en suite double rooms from £88, and dorms from £21 … perhaps the bargain of the year.
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Source: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/travel/where_to_stay/article6966099.ece
