The Business Top Suites
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The Business uests returning to the The Art Deco landmark partnered most elite suite at Paris’s with French crystal house Lalique Introducing the Prince de Galles hotel last and Berlin-based designer Patrick holiday season wouldn’t Hellmann to transform the three- have recognized their bedroom space and create one Super-Suite Gsurroundings. During the preceding of the city’s most lavish getaways. And six months, the duplex had been it embarked on the project somewhat stripped and reimagined, its decor out of necessity: In Paris’s increasingly COMPETITION TO ATTRACT PEOPLE entirely replaced with custom crowded luxury hotel market, LIKE YOU HAS RECENTLY MADE THE WORLD’S creations and fine art, its entry the Prince de Galles, a member of GREAT HOTELIERS PUSH THEIR staircase grandly redone in black Marriott’s Luxury Collection, needs MARQUEE OFFERINGS OVER THE TOP. lacquer and bronze and its windows to stand out if it wants to succeed. It’s extended to create panoramic views counting on Lalique’s cachet in China, By Andrew Sessa Illustration by Israel G. Vargas of the Eifel Tower and Sacré-Coeur. Hellmann’s popularity in Russia and ROBBREPORT.COM 137 G2G_April_Biz_Hotels.indd 137 3/6/20 3:41 PM The Business the hotel’s contemporary Art Deco guest’s entourage of security detail, Mandarin Oriental Paris, which opened design, for which it is internationally assistants and other professional and in 2011. He notes that competition has known, to attract ultra-afuent guests personal staf. The largest recent party increased dramatically in his city: In the from around the world. to book the Suite Lalique, for example— last decade, a Peninsula and Shangri-La The space—some 1,900 square whose prominent guests have so far have arrived, the Crillon and Le Meurice feet on the hotel’s highest floors plus included a head of state—took nine were majorly renovated, and a Bulgari a 1,050-square-foot terrace with rooms in addition to the suite itself. and Cheval Blanc, from LVMH, will 280-degree city views—now includes “Travelers are spending a lot more soon launch. “Creating more luxurious such knockout features as crystal wall on lodging these days, so we’re seeing and spectacular suites is a way to panels and bedside lamps based on a big increase in luxury development,” diferentiate,” Leboeuf says. To that end, says Matt Arrants, of hospitality last June his hotel debuted the four- consultancy Pinnacle Advisory Group. bedroom, 4,600-square-foot Parisian “THE RETURN PER SQUARE FOOT It bears out in the data. According to Apartment suite, a $35,300-a-night information gathered by the Global penthouse by sought-after French studio ON THESE SUITES CAN BE 5 TO Business Travel Association and CWT Gilles & Boissier. 100 TIMES WHAT’S GARNERED BY (formerly Carlson Wagonlit Travel), Paris may be emblematic of this average daily rates have steadily risen over phenomenon, but there are plenty of A REGULAR ROOM.” the last six years, by as much as 3.7 percent other cities experiencing this change. in 2018 and 2019. And when new hotels In London—expected to add 8,000 Lalique’s iconic Masque de Femme, enter a market, Arrants says, “existing hotel rooms this year, 10 percent a door with a golden mosaic in a properties definitely have to up their of them luxury—the six-year-old herringbone pattern and bathrooms game. They know the consumer is going Rosewood launched its three-bedroom, of dark Grigio Carnico marble, their to be drawn to the shiny new object.” 2,700-square-foot, $14,300-a-night crystal taps echoing the bubbled surface “Suites are key for hotels here,” says Lincoln House this past fall in a former of Lalique’s Mossi vases. It pushes the Philippe Leboeuf, general manager of the private event space. The project came design envelope in every way and nudges the outlay to $17,300. The latest in a spate of new Parisian premium accommodations, the Suite Lalique by Patrick Hellmann is part of a rising trend in the French capital and worldwide: To keep up with ever- increasing competition, hotels must radically remaster and expand their penthouse suites—and create new ones—or face the consequences. And they are turning to in-demand designers and collaborations with need-no- introduction brands to do so. The hotels hope these projects will help enhance their image and boost their bottom lines. The drive to do both has created something of an arms race in the luxury sector: Battling to outdo one another, hotels are creating an embarrassment of riches to impress the extraordinarily wealthy. Hotels lavish attention—and budget— on these accommodations because they’re a calling card. “They help define the hotel’s personality and create a true unique selling point,” says Jack Ezon, founder and managing partner of Embark, a travel advisory that creates high-end bespoke trips. They also have the potential to be cash cows. “The return per square foot on these suites can be 5 to 100 times what’s garnered by a regular room,” Ezon continues. “Hotels that are looking to keep their average daily rates high bank on mega-suites to attract royals, oligarchs and other ultra-high-net-worth multi- generational families.” The vast Ty Warner Another part of the economic appeal: Penthouse at the When such a suite is booked, so are a Four Seasons in fleet of additional rooms to house the Midtown Manhattan 138 APRIL 2020 G2G_April_Biz_Hotels.indd 138 3/6/20 3:41 PM The Business about “to ensure we stay innovative and relevant,” says managing director Michael Bonsor, “and that we continue Out of Ofce with to exceed expectations.” Despite other similar spaces in the city—such as the 2,850-square-foot Royal Suite at the Savoy HENRIK FISKER and the 4,850-square-foot Sterling Suite at FOUNDER OF FISKER INC. the Langham—the Rosewood has recently had so many requests for large suites that Henrik Fisker has been an innovator and disrupter it couldn’t keep up with demand. in the field of transportation since graduating from In Boston—whose hotel boom will ArtCenter College of Design in Switzerland more see the luxury-room count doubling—the than three decades ago. The former president and city’s longstanding Boston Harbor Hotel CEO of BMW Designworks USA crafted the BMW (BHH) carved its new penthouse-floor Z8 before moving on to Aston Martin and envisioning John Adams Presidential Suite out the DB9 and V8 Vantage. But, arguably, he’s most of former event space too. The room recognized for the eponymous Fisker Automotive and opened months before the city’s Four the $102,000 Karma hybrid sedan, a model that had Seasons One Dalton Street debuted. its plug pulled in 2013 due to investment and supplier “We knew our existing top suite product struggles (Karma has since been reborn as a new just didn’t compete,” says general marque under diferent ownership). manager Stephen Johnston. The new Since then, the consummate entrepreneur has 4,800-square-foot, $15,000-a-night been busy collaborating on passion projects, including Adams suite—set under the hotel’s iconic a 164-foot superyacht concept he designed with Benetti in 2016. His latest venture, however, rotunda, with a private elevator, a service is more proletarian: the Fisker Ocean, an all-electric SUV whose interior features materials kitchen and waterfront views through made from recycled T-shirts, plastic bottles and fishing nets. Says Fisker: “This will be a real double-height glass walls—now very game changer—a sustainable and afordable luxury car.” VIJU MATHEW AND TIM CHAN much does. Manhattan, meanwhile, may well be the only city to give Paris a run for its money as the place plus ultra of this What is the one thing you What would you tell your How do you manage phenomenon. The arms race arguably have to do every day to stay younger self? your e-mails? began here a few years back, in Midtown, sane? Save the contact details I make sure to clear all when the Four Seasons debuted the I take time to work out. of all the interesting and of them out, every day. 4,300-square-foot, $50,000-a-night one- But first, a cup of hot important people you I try for short, one- bedroom Ty Warner Penthouse, designed water with lemon, to meet along the way. line responses. No in collaboration by Peter Marino, I. M. detox, and a great “meeting sessions” via Pei and Ty Warner himself, the hotel’s “homemade” cofee with What was your first job, e-mail—those are usually billionaire owner. And now the Park Indian ghee butter and and what did you learn from a waste of time. Hyatt has a similarly priced, similarly cinnamon. it that influenced your sized super-suite: the three-bedroom, career? What’s your typical 59th-floor Manhattan Sky Suite, designed What is your biggest At BMW in Germany. The daily commute? by Jefrey Beers, with floor-to-ceiling annoyance at work? biggest thing I learned A good 27 miles one way, windows and 360-degree views, plus an Because of my nature as was that it’s better to ask which takes 45 to 55 art collection that includes originals by an automotive designer, for forgiveness later minutes on LA freeways. the likes of Philip Guston and Sarah Sze. I would say it’s not having rather than permission up Of course, it’s all- Beyond abundant bedrooms, enough time to sit and front. And this lesson electric.