[Ed. Note: Our Scandinavian correspondent Coulter returns again for the complete review of the first-ever CitizenM Hotel. Enjoy.]
Even from the outside there seems to be something a bit different about the CitizenM at Schiphol airport in Amsterdam. Unassuming from a distance, as you follow the embedded lights in the sidewalk, you'll start to notice that there is something a bit different about this hotel.
It looks like a stack of a few hundred individually made concrete cubicles with wall-to-wall windows.
The reason, because that's exactly what it is, CitizenM's prefab hotel units are at the very core of what this hotel strives to be. The same hotel experience no matter where you go, with each room identical to the room next to it.
Their tag line is “Affordable Luxury,” a modern design hotel at budget prices and it's these pre-made cubicles that allow them to deliver at least partially on that promise.
[Ed. Note: Our Scandinavian correspondent Coulter was on the scene for the opening party of the first-ever CitizenM Hotel. Enjoy.]
Last week CitizenM opened it's first hotel at Schiphol airport in Amsterdam. This location is one of 20 new hotels CitizenM plans to roll out through Europe in the coming months and years.
This being the hotel's first major event, CitizenM did their best to impress and after a few hours of non-stop drinking, I found myself fairly well-impressed.
For Rattan Chadha, founding partner and CEO Michael Levie, this event was all about branding and from the multiple speeches to the increasingly drunk PR people walking around, you couldn't escape the words "affordable luxury."
With the idea of CitizenM being a modern design hotel at budget prices, you must be wondering--did the hotel meet their tag line? You'll have to read the hotel review tomorrow for that answer, but the party itself did a good job of showing off the hotels finer points.
As promised we had a spy attend the opening of the CitizenM Hotel near Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport on Tuesday and he's reported back with this killer snapshot of the lobby area. The full review will come next week and it involves dolls on the bed and capsule showers. Yeah, it's very interesting.
How does an airport hotel win the title of "Number One Hotel in Texas" from the 2008 Expedia Insider's Select List? We headed to the Grand Hyatt DFW, in the new Terminal D at DFW airport, to investigate.
Now, don't get us wrong, we never judge a hotel based on its proximity to an airport, but we were a little bit skeptical here. The last airport hotel we stayed in was so noisy that it made us feel like we were asleep inside a tornado. And frankly, after we'd checked out, we sort of wished a tornado would come by and level the building so nobody else would have to endure such an experience.
So why anyone would rank an airport hotel -- no matter how nice -- above the rest of the hotels in the Lone Star State was a mystery to us.
OK, fine, so Heathrow's not exactly a vacation hot spot, but since its opening last year, the hotel has earned rave reviews from travelers faced with long layovers or early a.m. flights. Often compared to a cabin on a cruise ship, guests profess love for the property's comfy beds, free WiFi, rain shower and accessibility, in that you can book a room for as little as four hours.
As one reviewer put it: "Far better than the transit lounge benches!"
While the Aloft in Lexington, Massachusetts has been hyped since the beginning of time as the very first Aloft hotel to open come August 1st, sneaky Canada has gone and opened the Aloft Montreal, making it the first Aloft to open anywhere in the real world and not just Second Life.
Developed and owned by the joint venture between Silver Hotel Group and Northampton Group Inc., the 136-room aloft Montreal Airport will offer a variety of intuitive technologies, atmospheric public spaces, and a whole array of appealing guest amenities. Created for today's traveler, aloft hotels are modern, fresh and fun, with loft-inspired design and free-flowing energy.
Our anger at Aloft aside (WTF? Why did you hype Aloft Lexington for YEARS then open first in Canada?!?), we found rooms tonight at Aloft Montreal and what we first found wasn't cheap. $229 CAD ($224 US) for an internet rate which is to be fully pre-paid and no cancellations excepted. Another WTF!?
Then we checked again five minutes later and the prices had been sorted out to $189 a night for the internet rate and $199 for the Best Available Rate. The Corporate rate was listed as $229. Whatever. Our suggestion? Don't trust this website on its first day open. Call the hotel to book.
It's been a while since we last took a look at easyHotel, the European lodging chain for the incredibly frugal-minded.
The nearly three-year-old chain now has properties throughout London, as well as Budapest, Basel and Zurich. Its latest hotel opens today in Luton, featuring special opening rates of $39.45.
Before you rush to book that darling rate, remember the adage that "you get what you pay for." In this case, the attractive price at this 58-room hotel in Luton's city center does not include use of a TV, towel changes, Internet access or housekeeping services--all things that require you pony up anywhere between $2 and $20 to use.
It's all part of the master plan by the singularly monikered Stelios, easyHotel's chairman, to appeal to the cost-conscious--fine, we'll just say it: cheap--traveler. With the launch of easyHotel Heathrow later this summer, the company will continue to focus on establishing hotels near airports, with more properties appearing throughout Europe and the Middle East in 2009.
TripAdvisor has just published a hot-list of the top 10 Dirtiest Hotels in the US and UK.
The one that touched our hearts is the Europa Gatwick in Crawley, near Gatwick Airport in the UK, because we had the misfortune to grow up there.
The Europa is currently only 4th on the list, but we reckon the fact of being located in one of the most revolting towns in the UK would bump it right up to the top.
