Bangkok Travel Guide
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Bangkok's Chaophya Park Hotel Has The Best Multi-Use Key Cards Ever
Security issues aside for the moment, Chaophya Park Hotel in Bangkok, Thailand has what are possibly the best hotel room key cards ever: they also function as one-day subway passes. It's the first hotel in Bangkok to offer the amenity of hotel-keys-as-subway-passes since it lies along the MRT route of public transportation. But it won't be the last; the MRT is looking to partner up with further hotels in Bangkok and make this a regular perk.
Still, the Chaophya Park might look like your typical business hotel in the picture above, but judging from this new feature and the fact that they've got iPod docking stations in the rooms, have greening initiatives, and are the first hotel in Thailand to offer free internet, the Chaophya Park is more dynamic than boring.
Now let's talk security...
Tags: Hotel Bathrooms / Hotel Bathtubs / Bangkok Hotels / Sofitel Hotels / → All Tags
Centara Bangkok's Circular Soaking Tub Would Round Out Our Week
We don't know about you, but we feel like it's been a long week. And one of our favorite ways to unwind at week's end? A soak in the tub. One of the first things we do when entering a hotel room is to duck into the bathroom to check the shower/bath situation. Tubs—or rain showers and extra jets in shower-only setups—usually elicit whoops of glee. So when we saw this photo of the tub from a guest room at the Centara Grand Bangkok we swooned. We may have seen bigger tubs in our hotel travels, but this one is just so damn cute in its roundness. (All that space around it is pretty appealing, too.)
Tags: Edition Hotels / Hotel Hype / Bangkok Hotels / Hotel Renderings / → All Tags
Jenga! More Photos of Edition Hotel Bangkok Revealed
Hotels Magazine has also discovered the forthcoming Edition Hotel Bangkok in all its Jenga-esque glory. But that's not all that's inside this hotel.
After you remove one block and place it on top of the pile, a Ritz-Carlton Residences is revealed with 200 "customized single-level and duplex condos." The 150-room Edition Hotel, spawned from Bill Marriott and Ian Schrager, will be also be a part of the 77-story tower, which will be the tallest hotel in Bangkok and include "a landscaped outdoor public plaza, 110,000-square-feet of retail space, gardens and terraces spread over several levels for restaurants, cafes, and a 24 hour marketplace." (Hotels Mag has a plethora of renderings to check out.)
But goshdarnit, why does Bangkok have to be so far away? We are still hoping Bill and Ian open one in the continental U.S. before then. Also far away? The opening date which is still projected to be 2012. Construction should begin this fall.
Tags: Edition Hotels / Hotel Hype / Hotel News / Bangkok Hotels / → All Tags
Edition Bangkok: It's On, Baby
Edition lives! A website called Architectural Record has announced that the Marriott-Schrager hybrid — which has yet to open a single property — is going to be coming to Bangkok as a component of the forthcoming MahaNakhon tower and plaza.
Inside the 1.6 million-square-foot, $515 million complex will be 200 apartments and a 150-room Edition hotel, as well as "mixed-use public and commercial space." Construction on the tower won't be starting until later this year, so the expected (fairly generous, we think) completion date is going to be in late 2012.
Some deets about the 77-story "centerpiece" tower:
A spiraling incision of “architectural pixels” travels up the building, interrupting the curtain wall to reveal a series of terraces for larger units and shared spaces. This frenetic expression, according to Scheeren, came out of the psyche of Bangkok itself, which he describes as “the most intense and chaotic” of Southeast Asian cities. Throughout the “pixels,” the tower’s conventional glass curtain wall is disintegrated into cubes that will feature a variety of vegetation circling up the building, reflecting what Scheeren calls “the constant struggle between civilization and nature” in the tropical city.
Okay then. Edition is moving, at least. Slowly — very slowly — but surely. Hooray!
Tags: 100 or Less / Dream Hotels / Bangkok Hotels / → All Tags
Hotels for $100 or Less: The Dream Bangkok
All this week, we'll be profiling hotels for $100 or less. Yay! Know of any other bargains? Send 'em to us.
While we're not sure what's happening with Vikram Chatwal's Chatwal Hotel in NYC, the Dream Bangkok is still alive and offering room rates for under $90.
A tipster let us know that room rates are currently at $86 but if you're an Amex card holder you can get your room for just $77.
We checked for a room on May 3 and indeedy, a $86 rate popped up for a classic room with a plasma TV, iPod nanos to use during your stay and an all-time HotelChatter fave, bathrobes! Wanna spend more to get more? The junior suite is available for only $162.
How much of a deal is this? Well, when the Dream opened up a few years ago, rooms were priced at $160 a night. It seems we're starting to like the recession more and more.
Tags: Le Meridien Hotels / Starwood Hotels / Thailand Hotels / → All Tags
Le Meridien Going For The "European Chic" Look
After Starwood finally was able to get the Aloft and Element brands off the ground and open, their next job is to reinvigorate the Le Meridien brand which they bought in 2006.
The Le Meridien Bangkok just opened in December and is the first hotel to show off this new design concept which Starwood will formally introduce in March, according to an article in the Bangkok Post.
Le Meridien will be going for the "European Chic" look, which will build on the LM100 promotion that Le Meridien presently is running in their hotels and on their website.
Tags: Holiday Hotels / Bangkok Hotels / → All Tags
Centara Grand in Bangkok Will Bake You Christmas Cake
Weird but true: Bangkok hotels seems to have a monopoly on Christmas ideas that we actually like the sound of. The latest is at the Centara Grand at Central World.
Centara’s interest in Christmas probably comes from its German president Gerd Steeb, and that’s led to a furious baking of Christmas cakes and puddings for Centara Grand guests in the lead-up to December 25.
Apparently they had to put 22 pounds of raisins, 15 pounds of dried apricots, 15 pounds of pitted dried prunes and 14 bottles of rum on the shopping list to create enough Christmas treats for us. We’re wishing that they’ll send us a Christmas cake to try even though we can’t make it to Bangkok this festive season.
[Photo: aloshbennett]
Tags: Holiday Hotels / Hilton Hotels / Bangkok Hotels / Hotel Deals / → All Tags
Is Bangkok An Odd But Good Choice For Christmas?
HotelChatter's AmandaK is already looking forward to Christmas.
Thailand’s not exactly what we’d consider a Christmas destination--all those Buddhists aren’t really into the Santa Claus thing--but apparently that doesn’t stop the Millennium Hilton Bangkok putting together a bunch of Christmas offerings.
It’s going to start the second you walk into the hotel. The Millennium Hilton says it will be
adorning its lobby with an elegant centre piece of a gigantic gold Christmas tree hanging inverted from its ceiling.
An upside-down Christmas tree? It seems to match with the upside-down-ness of spending Christmas in Thailand. One smart point about this idea is that Bangkok is a great place to shop so bringing home gifts should be easy.
In the hotel restaurant they’ll have “Christmas feasts” as well as carol singing and a visit from Santa. A Thai Santa is something we’re kind of curious to see, we admit.
Getting a double room for a week over Christmas starts at 5,760 Thai baht (US$163) a night, or a bit less if you pay in full in advance. Probably low enough rates to have some Christmas shopping cash left over, or you can hope that the Thai Santa brings you a gift.
[Photo: susmis]
Tags: Anti-View / Bangkok Hotels / → All Tags
Room With an Anti-View: Don't Choose First House Hotel First in Bangkok
You know the scene. You open the door to your brand new hotel room, run over to the window, open the blinds and bam, you are hit with the anti-view. Maybe you are looking down a dirty alley, witnessing a drug deal, staring at an air shaft in the face, or seeing a brick wall. Whatever you are viewing it is not extremely pleasurable. Help out your fellow hotel mavens by uploading your anti-views to the HotelChatter/Flickr photo pool, or by sending the photo along to us. Remember to tell us the name of the hotel and the room number with the not-so-easy-on-the-eyes view.
This picture at the First House Hotel in Bangkok is not the worst anti-view we've ever seen. Sure, the walls are a bit grubby and the roof looks a bit unsteady, but there's a tree and something like a temple in the distance. But the caption that comes with the photo helps add it to our anti-view catalog:
When we found that there was a huge dent in the mattress there and that the bathroom smelled very bad, we moved.
Apart from the smelly bathroom and dented mattress found in at least one room, the First House Hotel actually features air-conditioning and cable TV in every room, with the air-con being a definite must have in steamy Bangkok. For a standard room for two you pay 1700 Baht (just US$54) for the privilege; dented mattresses and less-than-beautiful views all included.
[Photo: jystewart]
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Bangkok's Luxury Hotel Wars Don't Seem to Be Affecting Guests, But Ugly Americans Are
Seems America isn't the world's only litigious society. There's Thailand, for example.
In Bangkok, the The Oriental has been slapped with a defamation lawsuit by the Thai Attorney General, following a libel claim from another hotel competitor, the lebua. Seems that an internal email memo sent by The Oriental's General Manager Kurt Wachtveitl last year to his hotel managers accused the lebua of poaching 26 staff members from yet another 5-star property The Peninsula Bangkok.
Oh the humanity! Can you imagine some employee actually wanting to work elsewhere, and perhaps for more money. But Wachtveitl's email, which has been reportedly sent to several other Bangkok hotel managers, was leaked to the public. Like that never happens in America.
Tags: Bangkok Hotel Reviews / Green Hotels / Eco-Hotels / → All Tags
A Green Hotel in Urban Bangkok: Yes, It's Possible
Gone are the days when being a green hotel meant guests slept in tents in the middle of a forest: these days you can be green even in the middle of a bustling metropolis like Bangkok. The Old Bangkok Inn is a small ten-room place that's got a number of neat strategies going to be environmentally friendly.
The owners of the hotel decided from the outset that they wanted to be environmentally sound and from the renovation of the original house to the hotel you see today, there were many decisions made to stay low impact. For example, only salvaged wood was used in the renovations and all the fixtures, linen and curtains were locally produced.
Tags: International Hotel WiFi / Bangkok Hotels / Hotel Technology / → All Tags
Oriental Bangkok Impresses With 802.11n
Apparently the Oriental Hotel Bangkok in Thailand's bustling capital is good for moe than Ayurvedic spas and cooking classes: they're pretty hot on the WiFi angle as well, judging by the latest developments there.
A recent Bangkok Post article claimed that the Oriental is the first place in the region to offer WiFi access to its guests wherever they are in the hotel complex. And even better, they say, it's all using a 802.11n network which, if you're not quite geeky enough to know, means that the range and bandwidth is a whole lot better than previous technologies. And as manager Paul Jones said:
Today's business travelers demand more than simple connectivity--they value voice, video and data options which are efficient, convenient, highly secure and most importantly can be accessed anytime, anywhere in the hotel.
Hear, hear! And dare we point out, it's not even just business travelers who are demanding good connectivity. Thumbs up to the Oriental Bangkok for getting a decent WiFi network in place and we hope that many more follow.
[Photo: dorywithserifs]
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