Tag: Sofitel Hotels View All Tags
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: TV Set Hotels / Sofitel Hotels / Los Angeles Hotels / Celebrity Scoop / Shaquillle O'Neal / → All Tags
Fresh Off Two HBO Guest Spots, The Sofitel Los Angeles Now Hosting 'Shaq Vs.'
If you visit Los Angeles with the hopes of spotting a celeb or watching a location shoot (and c'mon, who doesn't visit LA with those hopes?) then the Sofitel Los Angeles might be the best place for you to stay.
This summer we've seen the hotel show up in an episode of True Blood and Entourage, both Made-For-HBO hit television shows.
Next up for the hotel? Possibly at stint on the new Shaq Vs. reality show where baller Shaquille O'Neal goes up against other superstar athletes from different fields (and courts and pools) of sports. The NY Post reports that Shaq and boxer Oscar De La Hoya were seen touring the kitchen of Simon LA, helmed by Chef Kerry Simon at the Sofitel.
Rates at The Sofitel tend to be pricey, starting at $335 a night on their website. However, this hotel can be booked on Hotwire.com for a lot less but remember it's Hotwire and you do take your chances. The hotel is listed as a 4.5 star hotel in the Beverly Hills-West Hollywood region. Booking through Hotwire could also land you at the London West Hollywood right below the Sunset Strip which is also a pretty good place to be for celeb-spotting. We've spied Kevin Spacey there once. Just sayin'.
Tags: Entourage Hotels / TV Set Hotels / Sofitel Hotels / → All Tags
All's Well That Ends Well Again For 'Entourage' Boys at The Sofitel LA
The Sofitel LA has been a very busy hotel these days. Recently, the hotel was used as the setting for vampire hotel, Hotel Carmilla, in True Blood. Then last night, the boys of Entourage ended the episode in a typical Entourage fashion--toasting their success over dinner--at Simon inside the hotel.
So it might be hard not to hit up Simon (helmed by Chef Kerry Simon) for its legendary giant cotton candy and junk food platter, or the ever present eye candy that is almost consistently wearing tight Bebe dresses and hair extensions but the restaurant does have a pretty extensive menu ranging from wood-oven pizzas to sushi and steak. Plus Simon uses organic ingredients and most of the meat is is "farmed and harvested in a sustainable manner", as per the restaurant's website..
And let's not forget about the wine. Go ahead and order two bottles. Remember, E's paying.
Room rates start at around $335 a night on the hotel's website.
Tags: Hotel Spas / Sofitel Hotels / → All Tags
Sofitel Hopes You'll Be Sooo Relaxed at Their New 'SoSPA'
Plain old spas are SO passé. That’s why Sofitel teamed up with beauty brands Carita and Cinq Mondes to launch their new “SoSPAS” at the St. James location in London, and the one in Marseille on Bastille Day (that’s July 14 for your philistines), in hopes of sparking a new spa revolution.
Sofitel tells us that the point of the “So SPA” concept is:
“To encourage conviviality and exchange, Sofitel has created a spa concept rooted in open spaces. Therapy at So SPA by Sofitel is presented in a way similar to the menu of a French gourmet restaurant….Les Entrées (Starters), lasting 30 minutes, are designed for busy urbanites looking for rest and relaxation after a busy day. Les Plats Principaux (Main Courses) and Les Desserts last an hour and feature body massages, facials, hot-stone massages and other delights intended to nourish the body and soul.”
Who wouldn’t want a full meal of that?
Tags: Sofitel Hotels / Dubai Hotels / Abu Dhabi Hotels / China Hotels / → All Tags
Sofitel Takes On Middle East and China
Not a brand to stand around twiddling their thumbs at the moment, Sofitel is busy getting their hotels stuck into the Middle East. For a start, the Sofitel Dubai Jumeirah Beach is due to open sometime this year – press releases are saying September, but their website says July 1 and it looks like we can book rooms throughout July, starting at €150 ($215) – but that's not enough for Sofitel. They've just announced two more properties for the UAE, with Sofitel Dubai Sheikh Zayed Road in Dubai due to open in 2012 and in Abu Dhabi, the Sofitel Abu Dhabi Capital Plaza is already making progress, ready to take guests in 2010.
And it's not just the Middle East. We were already amazed when Sofitel opened their 23rd hotel in China but they're quickly following that up with three more. In southern China, close to Hong Kong, there'll be two new places: the Sofitel Dongguan and the Sofitel Guangzhou. On the east coast, you'll soon find the Sofitel Qingdao; all three of these new Sofitels are located in main business districts. Opening dates for the Chinese additions aren't being advertised just yet, but it sounds like it'll only be five minutes until we turn around and hear about even more.
[Photo of Sofitel Xian: Ksionic]
Tags: Hotel Openings / Shanghai Hotels / Sofitel Hotels / China Hotels / → All Tags
Sofitel Continues to Conquer China with 23rd Hotel
Whoa, we are totally blown away by the fact that Sofitel, after the recent opening of their Huanghe Sheshan Resort outside of Shanghai, now has 23 China properties. That is beyond awesome, considering how some chains tend to tiptoe cautiously into Asia. So what does this extra-urban resort bring to the area besides another Sofitel sign? Apparently, an escape from the bustling city and a whole boatload of objects d'art and Hermes toiletries.
Set within the Sheshan National Tourism Resort and only a 35-minute drive from the city, the hotel boasts 368 rooms, including 53 Luxury Suites and an Imperial Suite. An extra seven luxury villas also exist for the express purpose of making government officials and business delegations feel at home without metro surroundings. Hmm, this doesn't sound like the Sofitels we know (and love); this is like Mandarin Oriental territory. Nonetheless, this is a full-service resort with multiple restaurants, spas, pools, bars, and pool bars. For those desperate for an escape from the Shanghai grind, rates for spring are looking trim at 161 Euro for a Luxury King room.
[Image: Sofitel Huanghe Sheshan Resort]
Tags: Deal or No Deal / Hotel Packages / Sofitel Hotels / → All Tags
Sofitel's Seasonal Diversion Package
We hate to break it to Sofitel Hotels, but we're not so sure the high-rollin' professional kind of people that tend to jetset to London, Paris, New York, Rio, Sydney and Shanghai for the weekend can really take advantage of a fourth night free deal. Unless of course they could take off the Thursday or the Monday on that long weekend, and well, you know what everyone says: "not in this economy."
The hotel chain is offering a "Seasonal Diversion" package through May 25th. Besides that fourth night free, the deal includes "delicious chocolates for sweet indulgence" and a 4:00 pm late check-out.
Tags: Colombia Hotel Scene / Hotel Video Tours / Sofitel Hotels / HotelChatter Reviews / Colombia Hotels / Hotel WiFi / → All Tags
A Holy Night's Stay at the Sofitel Cartagena Santa Clara
Last month, Amanda Pressner gave Jaunted a report on her jaunt down to Colombia. This week, she is giving HotelChatter reviews of the hotels she checked into during her trip. Any questions or suggestions about the Colombia Hotel Scene? Let us know. Enjoy.
There’s something a touch naughty about shacking up for the night in a 400-year-old former convent that once housed an order Clarisian nuns. You wonder, as you prepare to spend a weekend living in sin in a room transformed from the women's spartan sleeping quarters into a sexy, 500-thread count love den—what would the sisters say if they could see you now?
Fortunately, while staying at the Sofitel Cartagena Santa Clara may qualify as a religious experience (it’s widely considered the most luxurious hotel in the old city) there’s no need to act discrete or be on your best behavior.
What was once a nunnery in the 1600s, and then a charity hospital in the mid 19th century was painstakingly restored in 1994 and eventually turned into a five-star 121-room property that’s has hosted everyone from the King of Spain, Bill Gates and Mel Gibson to Jasser Arafat, Fidel Castro and Mick Jagger.
We can bet that no matter what kind of bad behavior you’ve got cooked up for your stay, you’ve already been trumped by one of these guys—so have at it.
Tags: Anti-View / Amsterdam Hotels / Flickr / Sofitel Hotels / → All Tags
A Grand View of Glam Patio Furniture From Sofitel Amsterdam
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.
We always hesitate just a little bit when we post an Anti-View from a hotel in a big city. After all, it's a city and, with buildings right up next to each other and not a whole lotta flex room when it comes to selecting real estate, you're bound to see stuff outside your hotel room window that's not exactly Killer View material — people's houses, people having parties, people in other hotels, etc.
And yet. While the dreaded anti-views are more understandable in big cities, such conditions don't change the fact that they're still craptastic views that you don't want to see outside your expensive hotel room.
Tags: Airport Hotels / London Hotel Reviews / Sofitel Hotels / Hotel Technology / → All Tags
The Sofitel London at Heathrow Goes High-Tech on TV
We already figured out that the Sofitel London Heathrow T5 is pretty high on the high-tech side of hotel life, what with its complicated air-conditioner controls, referred to by tech-friendlier guests as "cool gizmos".
But now there is high-tech TV as well. The Acentic Panorama system just launched in the Heathrow Sofitel and this is meant to be a mix of on-demand and interactive TV services that should probably satisfy pretty much anyone. We're usually pretty fussy about this, but it certainly doesn't sound too bad to get this:
access to 500 international satellite TV channels and up to 250 movies - all available totally on demand and with the ability to pause, fast-forward and rewind the movies.
We were thinking that an airport hotel is not the place we're going to be spending a lot of time--mostly we just want to sleep there--but since many of the rooms at the Heathrow Sofitel include a TV in the bathroom, there's plenty of chance to watch the latest movie right to the end. Useful for some but not all, that's our final judgment.
Tags: Melbourne Hotels / Accor Hotels / Sofitel Hotels / MGallery Hotels / → All Tags
New Label for Old Hotel :: Grand Hotel Melbourne Becomes an MGallery Hotel
We got curious when fashionable Aussie blogger Karen Cheng said that the Accor Hotels people were sending her to stay at the "brand new" Grand Hotel by Sofitel on Spencer Street in Melbourne--we didn't think it was new. But a quick investigation soon found that in some ways, it is a bit new: it's just joined the exclusive MGallery hotel collection.
As far as we can figure out, the whole MGallery thing is meant to be a fancy version of the Mercure brand, hence the "M". To kick off the collection Accor have chosen eight hotels from their Sofitel and Grand Hotel Mercure chains to become MGallery hotels, and the Grand in Melbourne is one of them. Get it? So it's new, but not new.
Tags: Hotel Carpets / Los Angeles Hotels / Sofitel Hotels / → All Tags
Not a Fugly Carpet at the Sofitel LA?
In continuing our running tab on hotel carpets (yes, we are that geeky here), we present you with this photo taken at the Sofitel LA by Air Christophe. And we're thinking maybe this carpet is not so fugly? What do you think? Let us know in comments below.
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