United Arab Emirates Travel Guide
Underwater Hotels / Dubai Hotels / Hotel Pipe Dreams / → All Tags
It’s Baack... New Underwater Hotel in Dubai Announced (Again!)
Well, call us eternally optimistic, but once again it’s been announced that an underwater hotel is to be built off the coast of Dubai and we hope, that this time, it’s for real.
Designed by Poland-based firm, Deep Ocean Technology, the “Water Discus Hotel” is space-age good. Two discs comprise the main part of the hotel, connected by three vertical legs and a shaft that holds the elevator and stairs. One disc rises above the water and the other is submerged below.
Hotel Rates / Dubai Hotels / Hotel News / → All Tags
Supposedly, Hotel Rooms In Dubai Aren't Getting Any Cheaper
We don't really like being the bearer of bad news, we'd much prefer turning hotel lemons into lemonade. So when we heard room rates in Dubai were skyrocketing, we thought to ourselves, 'Really? With all those hotels, there must be at least some deals to be found.'
At the start of 2012, rising room rates had reportedly placed Dubai on top of Hong Kong, London, New York, Tokyo and Paris in terms of occupancy levels. AMEinfo reported that the hotel room count actually increased by almost 20,000 rooms between 2008 and 2012.
But we thought we'd take a quick look at what rooms are happening right now, and how much they're happening for.
Hotel News / Starwood Hotels / Dubai Hotels / Hotel Openings / W Hotels / Westin Hotels / St Regis Hotels / → All Tags
W, Westin and St Regis All Coming, At Once, To Dubai In 2017
What's missing from this picture?
If you've thought to yourself recently, 'Gee, Dubai sure is a great place to visit, but boy, would it be even better if they opened a W, Westin and St Regis there too!' then we're here to tell you your prayers have been answered. Starwood announced today that it will do just that, after signing an agreement with Al Habtoor Group (the same conglomerate responsible for the city's upcoming Waldorf-Astoria resort, and a few of its own hotels too).
All three hotels will get built onto the same, giant complex (a one million square-foot property, in case you were wondering), and the total room count will be 1,675. This on top of the fifteen other hotels that Starwood already operates in Dubai, including Le Meridien, Sheraton and Four Points by Sheraton. But, we suppose, there's always room for a few more...
Hotel Hype / Hotel Construction / Abu Dhabi Hotels / → All Tags
Is This The End of Hotels for Abu Dhabi?
It looks like in future years, we won't be adding too much to the Abu Dhabi section of our Master Hotel Openings List.
The UAE city will no longer be issuing new hotel licenses because, not-so-shockingly, there is apparently a big oversupply of hotel rooms. Reuters reports:
The average room rate in Abu Dhabi dropped 14 percent to about 450 dirhams in 2011, the paper said, as four thousand new rooms came online -- bringing the total number of hotel rooms to almost 23 thousand in the capital.
Yowza. And that oversupply exists even though 2.11 million guests stayed in hotels in Abu Dhabi in 2011.
Fortunately, hotels that are already under construction like the St. Regis and the Ritz-Carlton will not be affected by this new order. Even better, hotels with licenses that have not yet begun construction will still get to keep their licenses. So no worries, we can expect at least a few more thousand hotel rooms in Abu Dhabi in the coming years.
[Photo: Panoramas]
JW Marriott Hotels / JW Marriott Marquis Hotels / Dubai Hotels / Hotel Hype / Hotel News / → All Tags
JW Marriott Marquis Dubai to Be Tallest Hotel in the World
Well it looks like Marriott Hotels won't be relinquishing their title of "World's Tallest Hotel" anytime soon. Though that distinction belongs currently to the Ritz-Carlton Hong Kong come later this year, it will be wrested away by the JW Marriott Marquis in Dubai.
Marriott made the announcement today saying that the two towers of the 1,608-room hotel will stand 1,164 feet tall, making them just 85 feet shorter than the Empire State Building. And unlike other hotels in buildings this tall, the JW Marriott Marquis Dubai will be entirely dedicated to hotel operations.
Hyatt Hotels / Abu Dhabi Hotels / Hotel Architecture / Hotel Openings / → All Tags
The Leaning Hyatt of Abu Dhabi Has Finally Opened!
While we once thought that the Leaning Hyatt of Abu Dhabi, or, The Hyatt Capital Gate Abu Dhabi, would open by the end of 2010, it turns out the hotel needed an extra year to get things tilted just so.
But now the hotel, which is located on the top floors of the purposely 18 degrees leaning Capital Gate Building, is officially open for guests. The hotel has 189 rooms and suites, all featuring floor-to-ceiling glass windows with killer views of the Arabian Gulf and the city.
Even crazier than spending the night in a leaning tower is because of the way the building is constructed, guests cannot actually see the ground below them, making them feel as if the hotel room is floating in mid-air. We're guessing the vertigo-challenged might have some issues staying here. However, guests can see the ground below them from the hotel's inner atrium.
Hotel Christmas Trees / Abu Dhabi Hotels / Luxury Hotels / Holiday Hotels / Hotel Lobbies / → All Tags
On Second Thought, An $11 Million Christmas Tree Might Be Going Overboard
We think the Emirates Palace has gotten the message. Rather than strive to top last year's $11 million Christmas tree monstrosity, the hotel has graciously toned things down for the time being.
This month, guests at the gold-loving hotel won't be blindsided by a tree that's wearing more expensive jewelry than they are. Adorning the tree instead are custom-made Christmas balls from the Netherlands, and gold and silver foil ribbons. For good measure, the hotel also threw in some Christmas carolers. Who sang from gold-plated manuscripts atop gold podiums with gold plates on their teeth. A modest affair, really.
Hotel Openings / Park Hyatt Hotels / Abu Dhabi Hotels / Westin Hotels / → All Tags
Sneak Peek at The Park Hyatt Abu Dhabi
The Park Hyatt Abu Dhabi Hotel and Villas opened on November 1st and just in case some of you jetsetters out there have not made it to the new hotel, we've got a couple of interior snapshots to drool over, starting with that bedroom view.
The hotel is located on a nine-kilometer stretch of beach on Saadiyat Island, so most views from the rooms offer views of the beach. If you don't have a beach view, then you're probably looking out over the Saadiyat Beach Golf Club or the hotel's own gardens but no matter the view, each room has its own balcony or private terrace.
Elsewhere on the property is a the two-level Atarmia Spa, the Park Bar and Grill, the Library Bar (which serves tea and coffee specialties) and The Beach House, the beachfront restaurant which serves Mediterranean cuisine.
Cool Hotel Jobs / Ritz-Carlton Hotels / Dubai Hotels / Hotel Employees / → All Tags
The Ritz-Carlton Dubai Now Has a Hookah Sommelier on Staff
If you've ever wanted to smoke a hookah but were afraid of looking like a novice, the Ritz-Carlton Dubai International Finance Centre now has an expert on hand to ensure that every puff you take is perfect.
The Shisha Sommelier is a part of the hotel's Shisha Terrace. Shisha, also called hookah, is just smoking tobacco in a glass-based waterpipe but the Shisha sommelier is there to help guests choose the shisha flavor that will compliment their food and beverage or simply, their preference of tobacco flavor.
So who is this man tasked with such a cool hotel job? Sadek Zeineddine, a Lebanese national, who has worked in a food and beverage capacity in several different areas of the Middle East like Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and United Arab Emirates. Most recently, he was at another Ritz-Carlton hotel, the Sharq Village and Spa, before joining the Ritz Carlton Dubai on the pre-opening team.
Hotel Swag / Dubai Hotels / Hotel Gifts / → All Tags
The Case of the $7,250 Burj Al Arab Ashtray
The Burj Al Arab hotel in Dubai. It's world famous and ranked seven stars with four-digit nightly room rates, so naturally people get curious. For one, we're curious about what makes their hotel so worth that money, and what perhaps they might sell in the gift shop (cause you know they have one).
Well, the latter question has somewhat been answered for us by a weird little website called Opulent Items. Specializing in over-the-top luxury gifts, they'll sell you anything from a $7,500 inflatable "iceberg" to a $20 shower curtain, as Racked discovered yesterday. What they also dug up is this ashtray, priced at $7,250 and embedded with three diamonds.
Hotel News / Hilton Hotels / Waldorf-Astoria Collection / Dubai Hotels / → All Tags
Hilton Plans a Waldorf-Astoria Resort For Dubai (But They Won't Let Us See)
Hilton just announced that a 324-room resort on Palm Jumeirah in Dubai will become a Waldorf Astoria Resort by the end of 2013. Hilton is teaming up with Al Habtoor Group, who had originally bought the land but ran into major delays when the economy went down the drain in 2008, affecting all imminent Dubai properites.
Not only is Al Habtoor now re-starting construction on the $272 million resort, they are funding the entire project out of their own pocket. Apparently, the city's banks are so hard-pressed that receiving funding is virtually impossible. Al Habtoor also told Arabian Business that it is working on "other projects, which we are going to announce soon."
Click below to see a (not very visible) artist's rendering of the upcoming resort.
Celebrity Scoop / Kim Kardashian / Dubai Hotels / Celebrity Hotels / → All Tags
Kim Kardashian Wants to Open a Hotel for Gorgeous People
Brace yourselves, the day's hotel news just got a lot more depressing. WSJ is reporting on a statement made by Kim Kardashian about opening her own branded hotel in the United Arab Emirates. In her words: "everything I think will be successful here."
Hmm, a self-obsessed reality TV star with delusions of starting her own hotel? Haven't we heard this one before? Also, Kim you might want to stop copying the Hilton sisters at some point.
Kim is currently touring the country solo, and was apparently so swept away by all the beautiful women there that she took to Twitter to make her feelings known. So, she's got millions of dollars, has already visited a few of the world's glitziest hotels, and has a thing for beautiful women? Judging from what we know of other well-known lady-loving hoteliers, Kim certainly seems to fit all the criteria. All we ask is that she lays off the houndstooth. That's not so much to ask, is it?
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