92101 Travel Guide
Tags: Holiday Hotels / Omni Hotels / San Diego Hotels / Hotel Packages / → All Tags
Omni San Diego Tries to Offer Holiday Cheer with New Packages
Spending the holidays in a hotel may not seem very homey and warm, but the Omni San Diego, next to Petco Park in the downtown Gaslamp Quarter, wants to give it a go with several holiday packages.
The Stuff Your Stocking package starts at $99 a night. As you can guess from the package's name, the hotel will give you a personalized holiday stocking filled with coupons to stores and restaurants near the hotel. You'll also get a voucher that entitles you to stay in the hotel for the same rate in 2010.
Tags: Hotel Lounges / Hotel Restaurants / Luxury Collections Hotels / San Diego Hotels / → All Tags
The US Grant Tries to Stay Young with Lounge Renovation
San Diego's historic US Grant Hotel recently gave its lounge in the Grant Grill, which opened in 1951 and was a men's-only joint for a while, a renovation and new menu to keep up with the times.
To give it a more urban feel, Esteban Lopez and James Niebling of Esteban Interiors added metal bar tables with a silver-sparkle finish topped with quartz slabs of stone and metal aggregate. Another modern touch is the walnut-topped custom dining tables with solid inlay edges and corners, metal bases, and wood balustrade pedestal. The faux-leather bar stools and banquettes in muted ivory and tan shades with a metallic gray spray finish soften up the room a bit. Panels of mosaic tiles illuminated with sconces provide some warmth.
Tags: Hotel Fitness / Hotel Rooftop Pools / San Diego Hotels / Kimpton Hotels / → All Tags
Get Physical at Hotel Solamar's Poolside Pilates Classes
We'd rather do Pilates or another class-based workout over huffing it on a treadmill. So it's a given that at Hotel Solamar, we'll forgo the stuffy fitness center to work our core in the Poolside Pilates program. The incentive to exercise is that the alfresco class takes place on the chic fourth-floor rooftop terrace, which offers a view of the city's skyline.
The classes, which are free for hotel guests and $10 for non-guests (cheaper than most drop-in Pilates classes), take place Saturdays from 10 to 11 a.m. No need to BYOM, since mats are provided. Certified instructors from neighboring studio Hot Body Pilates will make you feel the burn and get your morning going with music that ranges from tranquil tunes to bumping beats.
Tags: Celebrity Scoop / San Diego Hotels / Ashlee Simpson / Pete Wentz / → All Tags
Pete Wentz and Ashlee Simpson Shack Up at the Se San Diego
Fall Out Boy rocker Pete Wentz, his wifey, Melrose Place startlet Ashlee Simpson, and their son Bronx Mowgli checked into the Se San Diego last week.
According to People magazine, the couple rented two condos in the hotel. The condos come with perks like retractable glass walls—to give your room that alfresco feeling—and since the condos are on the upper floors of the 23-story-tall building, they have sweet views of the city. Plus, the condos have chic touches like Nepali carpets, Italian built-in kitchens and islands complete with appliances, and bathrooms with televisions built into the mirrors and steam showers.
Tags: Motorcycle Hotels / Hotel Packages / Hard Rock Hotels / San Diego Hotels / → All Tags
Go Hog Wild with Hard Rock San Diego's Free Bikes
The Hard Rock is king when it comes to gimmick packages, courting guests with guitars and other freebies. This time, the Hard Rock San Diego is dangling complimentary motorcycles to get your motor running.
Buy the Hard Rock and a Hog package and you'll get to ride a Harley during your two-night stay. To complete your biker experience, the hotel includes a map of the best hog rides in the San Diego area and a gift bag of Harley-Davidson goodies. But you'll have to bring your own leather jacket. The Hard Rock also throws in a $40 credit for a breakfast at in-house restaurant Maryjane's and entry to rooftop lounge Float and bar 207.
Tags: Hotel Bars / San Diego Hotels / Wine-Tasting Hotels / → All Tags
The Ivy Hotel's Ultra Lounge Turns into a Wine Bar
San Diego's Ivy Hotel will unveil a new Ultra Lounge and Wine Bar on Oct. 1 to give you more and cheaper options to get tipsy off of vino.
Although the hotel's been promoting the "new Ultra Lounge and Wine Bar," it's not so much "new" as it is a shift in focus to wines. The Ultra Lounge didn't close for renovations or anything. Instead, 20 new WineStations were installed along orange walls in the ground-floor lounge.
The WineStations will pour 80 wines by the glass, allowing you three ways to get drunky-drunk: You can order "taste" portions at 1.5 oz. each, "half" glasses at 4 oz. and "full" glasses at 6 oz. Prices range from $1.76 for a taste of the 2007 Williamette Valley Riesling to a full glass of the 2004 Opus One for $28.47.
The taste option will allow oenophiles on a budget to sample some rare vintages for cheap, which is a departure for the luxury hotel, whose rooms run around $200 a night.
Tags: Green Hotels / Eco-Hotels / San Diego Hotels / Kimpton Hotels / → All Tags
The Convenient Truth Behind Hotel Solamar's 'Live Green, Stay Green' Package
Not one to slack in the eco department, even after winning a distinguished "World Saver" award this week, Kimpton continues their quest to greenify the planet, one hotel at a time.
San Diego's Hotel Solamar is already rife with Earth-friendly touches, like recycling bins, low-flow showers, and organic food at the hotel restaurant. For the ultra eco-friendly among us (we're looking at you, hybrid-driving, farmers market shopping readers), Hotel Solamar has just launched a Live Green, Stay Green package to give guests an all-out eco-aware experience.
Tags: Hotel Art / W Hotels / Starwood Hotels / Kanye West / → All Tags
The W San Diego Puts Kanye West On Display
The W San Diego may be on its way to foreclosure, but the hotel must figure if it's going to go down, it's gonna do it in style. The W is hosting a cool photo exhibit by Chris Milk—best known as a music video director to big-name musicians such as Kanye West, U2, Green Day and Gnarls Barkley—through September.
Among the oversized photos, which hang throughout the public spaces in the W, some of the best star frequent collaborator Kanye West. Milk, who directed videos for "Jesus Walks," "All Falls Down" and "Touch the Sky," used 3-D scanning and CGI to create the black-white-and-gray images for the works "Kanye West (Wall)" (shown above), where the rapper emerges from a wall of 3-D geometric shapes, and "Kanye West (Reflection)," where we see West's mug looking into a shiny silver sphere.
Originally, Milk created the images for a Complex magazine cover shoot for West. The pair worked with the studio that did the crazy CGI work on de-aging Brad Pitt in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.
Tags: Killer View / Hotel Indigo / San Diego Hotels / Ballpark Hotels / → All Tags
Watch The Padres From The Hotel Indigo's Parlor Suites
We are suckers for a room with a killer view. We find that we are even more likely to forgive some minor hotel inconveniences if we can stare out the window at something pretty--yeah we are that shallow. Let's help out our fellow hotel mavens by uploading rooms with killer views to the HotelChatter/Flickr photo pool, or by sending the photo along to us. We will feature our favorites in this space from time to time. Remember to tell us the name of the hotel and the room number of the hot view.
When we hit up the Hotel Indigo San Diego last month, there was a party being held on the hotel's 9th floor Phi terrace where guests could sip on drinks, warm up near the fire pits (yes, it gets cold at night) and take in the ballgame going on over at Petco Park.
While nearly everyone can hit up the terrace for the views, only folks who book the hotel's parlor suites can get prime (and private) views from their bedrooms. An added treat? Fireworks go off after weekend night games--win or lose.
We checked the room rates next weekend when the Padres are playing at home and we found a king bedroom parlor suite for $329 a night. As always when booking a room for the killer view, make sure to call the hotel in person and request a ballpark view before you arrive or when you make your reservation. Sorry, personal bartender not included. That was only for the party!
Tags: Insane Hotel Packages / Hard Rock Hotels / San Diego Hotels / Hotel Parties / Holiday Hotels / → All Tags
For One Million Dollars, Rent Out The Hard Rock San Diego for One Night
Remember how we mentioned that the Chatwal hotel would have rooms that cost "$1,000,000 a night?" Of course, that was probably a "lost in translation" or currency conversion snafu but now we've got word that the Hard Rock San Diego will actually be available for $1,000,000 for one night this holiday season. And the hotel is positioning it as the "Ultimate High Roller Holiday Gift."
Ok. Before we start in on this whole she-bang, let us at least tell you what you--the payer of a million dollars to a hotel--will get:
· Private jet transport for 10 VIPS from a "select" destination in the United States to San Diego with limos to the Hard Rock Hotel.
· Rooms for 420 of your closest friends and their plus 1s. Yes, the entire hotel is yours for the night (As it should be!)
· All-day private access to the rooftop pool including bottle service, daybed seating and cabanas.
· Spa Treatments at the Rock Spa. Pretty much anything you want.
· Unlimited Pinkberry at the shop located downstairs.
· Open Bar at the 207 bar.
· Private Dining at the Nobu sushi restaurant downstairs which will close to the public and serve its Omakase menu (chef's choice.)
· VIP Bash at the Float Lounge and Woodstock at 10pm. Open bar, food and a celebrity DJ.
· Morning After breakfast at Maryjane's coffee shop.
· A professional photographer to document every moment of this insanity.
Tags: Kimpton Hotels / San Diego Hotels / Hotel Pools / → All Tags
More Hotels Want You To Act Like Kids: The Urban Playground at Hotel Solamar
Kimpton’s Hotel Solamar might usually have the burnished image of a hip boutique hotel (with a few eco-initiatives) situated in the heart of San Diego’s swinging Gaslamp District, but this summer, the grown-up hotel is offering guests a chance to be kids again with its “Urban Playground” specials running through September 7. (Side note: what is up with hotels telling adults to be kids again this summer?)
Now guests can spend Saturday night partying in the Gaslamp’s myriad bars, like the whimsical new Syrah Wine Parlor, and then work off the booze on Sunday playing their favorite basement rec room games like foosball and ping pong up at the hotel’s rooftop pool. Poolside cabanas come equipped with Nintendo Wii, so you can show off your Rockband and Guitar Hero skills while getting a tan.
Tags: HotelChatter Review / Hotel Indigo / San Diego Hotels / IHG Hotels / → All Tags
Hotel Indigo San Diego is Proof That a Big Chain Can Do 'Boutique' Right
We've played Guess the Hotel with you and we've shown you the video tour, but now let's really get down to talking about our experience at the Hotel Indigo San Diego, the flagship property for the Hotel Indigo brand from InterContinental.
The Lobby
The Hotel Indigo has a great lobby. It's actually quite pretty, for lack of a better descriptive design adjective. Everything was simply calm and eye-pleasing. No loud music. No too-strange art pieces and no mood-lighting changing every five seconds. Since Hotel Indigo as a brand incorporates as much of the local culture as possible into the identity of the hotel, the lobby actually feels like someone's very upscale beach house — despite being located in downtown San Diego.
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