http://www.hotelchatter.com/ Hotel Reviews, Hotel Ratings, Hotel Openings en-us Copyright 2008 - SFO Media 2008-10-11T00:04:08Z HotelChatter HotelChatter http://www.hotelchatter.com/images/hcwhite.jpg http://www.hotelchatter.com/tag/England%20Hotels http://www.hotelchatter.com/story/2008/9/16/5479/69961 <![CDATA[<img src="http://www.hotelchatter.com/files/3873/Birmingham_Staying_Cool.jpg" class="imgborder"><p> <p>We're not quite sure if we could book ourselves into accommodation called <a href="http://www.stayingcool.com/"><b>Staying Cool</b></a> but we admire the gall of people who could. <p>The Staying Cool moniker belongs to a group of serviced apartments in Birmingham, Manchester, Devon and Barcelona, and they strive to be, as you'd imagine, pretty darn cool. In their own words, Staying Cool apartments are: <blockquote><p> the hip alternative to a hotel ... kitted out with bespoke pieces from some of the hottest UK designers, serviced to meet all your needs but with the independence and individuality (no two are the same) of your own wow apartment.</blockquote><p>The Birmingham <b>Staying Cool at Rotunda</b> property has just been given the first five-star rating in amandak 2008-09-17T09:30:28-05:00 http://www.hotelchatter.com/story/2008/8/26/4247/03810 <![CDATA[<img src="http://www.hotelchatter.com/files/1425/lutonhoo_4weddings.jpg" class="imgborder"><p> <p>The <a href="http://www.hotelchatter.com/hotel-reviews/Luton+Hoo+Hotel+Golf+And+Spa/ian/258786"><b>Luton Hoo Hotel</b></a> in England doesn't have this name just to inspire bad "Luton <i>Who</i>?" jokes. Apparently "hoo" means "hill" in old Saxon so really it's the plain old Luton Hill Hotel. But it's got a great selling point that it was one of the reception venues in Hugh Grant's <a href="http://www.movie-locations.com/movies/f/4wandf.html">Four Weddings and a Funeral</a>--we definitely want to tread in Hugh's footsteps.<p>The UK <i>Independent</i> reviewed the Luton Hoo recently and had mostly positive feedback to give. It's only been a hotel for a short time, after being a neglected private house for many years, so most of it's newly renovated--although 1980s touches like peach-colored paint, weird stripes and gold taps remain, which we're not amandak 2008-08-26T10:15:16-05:00 http://www.hotelchatter.com/story/2008/7/8/85052/54075 <![CDATA[<img src="http://www.hotelchatter.com/files/1425/budockvean.png" class="imgborder"><p> <p>The Green Travel Award nominations at the UK <i>Times</i> often include some of those rustic, roughin' it, super-green types of eco-hotels where you can't flush the toilet or need rubber boots to get to the dining hall. <p>But recently they suggested something much more civilized: <a href="http://www.hotelchatter.com/hotel-reviews/Budock+Vean+Hotel/local/1277"><b>Budock Vean Hotel</b></a>, a country hotel near the Helford River in Cornwall, southwest England.</p><p>The Budock Vean (which has a kind of a subtitle: "The Hotel on the River") is a 59-room four-star hotel, complete with a 9-hole golf course, swimming pool, sauna, spa and tennis courts, but it's also good at being green. For example, it is careful to support local industry: 80% of the hotel's expenditure goes in to the amandak 2008-07-09T09:30:13-05:00 http://www.hotelchatter.com/story/2008/5/8/9255/38695 <![CDATA[<p> <img src="http://www.hotelchatter.com/files/11725/summer_lodge_country.jpg"class="imgborder"><p>Nothing screams high-society Brit like teatime in a lavish garden. Throw in an elaborate country house hotel, complete with a croquet lawn and four acres of gardens, and you've got yourself an anglophile's paradise. <p> Such is the <a href="http://www.hotelchatter.com/hotel-reviews/Summer+Lodge/ian/172973"><b>Summer Lodge Country House Hotel</b></a> in the town of Evershot, in Dorset's countryside, whose non-English specific features also include a spa and heated indoor pool. <p> Through November, the hotel is offering a package centered on Dorset's various and famed gardens, which includes two nights' accommodations in a Superior Room (with garden views), full English breakfast, nightly three-course dinner, a property tour, and visits to Montacute House and Tintinhull Gardens, both manor houses surrounded by--<i>yup</i>--gardens. <p>Plus, you'll get to jennm 2008-05-08T13:18:15-05:00 http://www.hotelchatter.com/story/2007/11/21/1195/2960 <![CDATA[<p><img src="http://www.hotelchatter.com/files/admin/chewton_glen.jpg" class="imgborder"><p> To uncover the ultimate WASP hotel estate, we figured we'd head back to the mothership -- the region in Southeast England where the original Anglo and Saxon tribes settled in the fifth century. Their descendents rule over most Fortune 500 companies, feel confident in Madras pants, and don't mind spending about $600 a night to stay at a place like <a href="http://www.hotelchatter.com/hotel-reviews/Chewton+Glen/ian/172971"><b>Chewton Glenn</b></a> in Hampshire, England.<p>The hotel ranks as the second best in the United Kingdom according to Conde Nast Traveler's 2007 ranking. Amenities in the 58 rooms include everything one would expect from a top-tier establishment. The spa, ranked as number one by Traveler, includes some masochistic sounding treatments -- cold drench showers and molten brown ced138 2007-11-21T09:09:49-05:00 Search HotelChatter string http://www.hotelchatter.com/search/