Gone are the days of a world where a Don-Draper-esque ad campaign for Hilton Hotels can attract new and sustaining guests based upon the promise that while andttending one of their hotels at any location globally one would feel as if they are in their hometown in America. According to Gillmore and Pine the reason we are seeing less and less advertising like this is “people increasingly see the world in terms of real and fake.” The global economy is based upon a need and desire to acquire authenticity in products or services, though the means by which the world tends to consume and perceive authenticity changes and evolves over time just as any style or trend. Recently the perception of authenticity has been manifested by an economy founded around services offered as it transitions into a new trend where authentic offerings must increasingly be based upon fully immersed and customized experiences. In an economy based upon seeking experiences, authenticity can be achieved by insuring that each consumer feel they are having a one of a kind experience. One specific area that is proving to embrace the transition from a service economy to experience economy is the boutique hotel trend.
Also known as lifestyle hotels, boutique hotels is a loose term defining hotels which do not appear as cookie cutter, where each room, or each individual hotel captures a completely new experience for each guest. The total immersion into a unique space creates a bond between environment and human in an emotional sensation captured by the notion that one is
experiencing something completely different from the guest in the next room, or the room they stayed in last time they visited the establishment. The hotels resemble a shift in global
consumerism and economy tending towards objects and activities which immerse the consumer in an experience, created by well thought out aesthetic and sensory elements.
Designer Ian Schrager has been seen at the forefront of the boom in unique boutiques even working with large hotel chains like Marriott to spread the boom of boutique. Also, Schrager has expanded the boundaries on designed experience. Apart from hotels, restaurants and products which he intends as means of escapism, he has moved onto luxury apartments in New York (which are already sold out) located at the well known Gramercy Park Hotel. “I wanted to change the way people live, to create effortless luxury living with all of the benefits of residential ownership and a unique five-star, world class hotel, to introduce a revolutionary concept in urban living,” the designer explains his view.
Jane Levere wrote in a column for the New York Times titled The Rush to Boutique: “Developers can more easily convert an existing structure like an office building into a hotel.” This is an interesting observation because it points out one of the major implications that a boutique hotel inherently carries, which is the ability to mesh into a local setting, playing upon a sense of localization in the design, and hence allowing the “referential authenticity” (Gillmore and Pine) to shine through in the design. Schrager was commissioned by Mariott to create “W Hotels,” a series of large hotels that would capture the boutique market in cities around the world. For example, the “W” in downtown Minneapolis has transformed the Foshay Tower, a historic building which is essential to the city’s skyline and image, into a completely unique experience. Guests feel in touch with the surroundings, the design appears to grow out of the city center, rather than being supplanted from a corporate office. The capability to localize the design innately customizes the experience and therefore innately impacts the “rendering of
Another prime example of localization and customization built into a designer hotel is the small chain of Ace hotels. Originating in Seattle in 1999 the team of Calderwood, Weigel and Herrick transformed a huge salvation army halfway house into the first Ace hotel. From
2007-2010 new Aces have opened in Portland which utilizes the former Clyde hotel and remains on the national historic registry, one in Palm Springs renovated out of a 1960s motel style
building and a New York location built into the 1904 building originally occupied by the historic Hotel Breslin. The Seattle and Portland locations “attracted national attention by capturing the zeitgeist of their own cities; every detail at the Ace, from the wool blankets to the wood trim, seemed rooted in the community.” (Blum, Metropolis 2009) The intentional use of buildings with history and character enable the designers to play upon preconceived notions of how a building like this is expected to look on the inside, allowing for a full sensory stimulation upon immersing into the cohesive experience within. Ace hotels are intended to appeal to the increasingly
populated creative class, and it seems that although the hotels have grown from 28 rooms in Seattle to 326 rooms in New York City, the team has succeeded in offering a unique and personalized experience to each guest.
Establishing their home within each urban landscape is essential to the Ace Hotels and while attention to detail goes a long way in designing interiors, (or anything aesthetically pleasing for that matter) aesthetic detail alone would not be enough to insure the success of an experiential concept such as the Ace’s. In order for a transformation to take place from a service offered into an authentic experience requires a top to bottom cohesive intention. Mentioned briefly in the July 2009 Metropolis article quoted above, the Ace Hotels have designed their own wool blankets with Oregon wool mill Pendleton and custom robes with help from a trendy,
high-end Canadian clothing line. Wings + Horns, that prides itself on local and sustainable methods. The many other offerings which the group has custom designed are sold on their website, which in contrast to the web pages of hotels like Mariott and Hilton, reads more like an urban outfitters ad with hip young people wearing mustaches, carrying dogs and riding bikes.
Furthermore, to achieve the intended cohesive experience, the hotel is decorated with original artwork and locally designed furniture, such as the orange couches found in the lobby of the midtown New York city location, which are custom made just miles away by Prestige
Upholstery in Brooklyn. Again, the local customization of design can be seen in the front desk which are steel work tables from Brimfield Barn, refinished and accented with custom leather. The furniture and fixtures found throughout the hotels create a harmony by adding variety in the mixed styles and color ways of the selections combined with an undeniable unity in the recycled, local and exposed feel of the design.
The discussed elements which utilize locally sourced, designed or reclaimed materials, and the attention to detail and sophistication of balanced design are instrumental to customizing the experience guests will be immersed in, but equally important is the unity and variety from room to room. Each room shares a comfortable chic theme, however the carefully chosen original artwork creates a custom interaction between guest and space, even if you stay in a different room within the same hotel, the experience is guaranteed to be something slightly different.
Of course, the tendency for the global economy to seek out authenticity in experiences as opposed to goods or services does not begin or end with boutique hotels but as observed in the case study of the Ace Hotels, when emphasis is placed on customization and localization there
are many qualities which imbue an innately authentic meaning. This frame of thinking is the reason that the boutique hotel business bounced back by ten percent in 2010, while only six percent of standardized hotels was regained (Levere, 2011). Economically, this approach seems to be working. Socially, the trend makes sense when considering the boom of locally sourced, organic, all natural products in other industries such as apparel and food. Authentic experience immersion is something which has always spoken to the masses, but as the trend gains popularity it becomes a requirement to succeed amongst competitors, we have only witnessed the beginning of the localization of custom design.
