Hospitality Design - January/February 2015 - 102

under the radar

vienna
While many European cities may be in
the spotlight now, Vienna is blossoming
as a burgeoning star in Western Europe.
A development boom in the city of
approximately 1.7 million is taking place,
and as of December 2013, there were 431
hotels with more than 31,000 rooms in
Vienna. That accommodation number is set
to increase over the next several years, with
15 hotels projected or planned to open by the
end of 2017, according to the Vienna Tourist
Board-six of which are currently under
construction. Last year alone, a number of
design hotels were unveiled in Austria's
capital city-most set in historical buildings
in or near Vienna's first district.

Meliá Vienna

Projects such as Meliá Vienna, which
opened last May, take the focus off the city
center and across the river to a developing
area of town. The hotel, Meliá Group's first
in the country, is located in Austria's tallest
building-the modern, mixed-use Danube
City Tower. Designed by French architect
Dominique Perrault, the 58-story skyscraper
ripples toward the heavens, reflecting the
flow of the Danube River beside it. The
property occupies 18 floors of the building,
including the top two levels where its 57
restaurant and open-air bar are located.
Designer Christian Jabornegg of locally
based Jabornegg & Pálffy Architects took
over when it came time to fit out the hotel's
communal spaces, where he accentuated
Perrault's design concept with "our
interventions," he says.
Meliá's first four floors house the lobby,
conference rooms, and the Flow Bar and
Restaurant, all connected by a hanging
stainless steel staircase. This massive,
shimmering corkscrew is complemented by
a series of glittering chains behind the stairs

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January/February 2015 hospitalitydesign.com

in the lobby, which were proposed by United
Design Partnership, the London studio in
charge of the guestroom design, "to create a
reflecting surface with a deep-view effect in
the windowless walls of the ground level,"
Jabornegg explains.

Finnegan of the semi-precious stone.

Ruby Soﬁe

Ruby Sofie opened last spring in
Sofiensäle-a 150-year-old renovated concert
hall-and veers away from traditional
5-Star perks, offering guests an innovative
concept. "Lean luxury, in a nutshell, is that
we have small, well-equipped, and hopefully
nicely designed rooms that we offer at a
surprisingly low price point," says owner
and designer Michael Patrick Struck. The
hotelier cut costs by foregoing formal dining,
parking, or a fitness space, but what Ruby
lacks in typical amenities, it makes up for in
creative and quirky style.
Struck incorporated Sofiensäle's
theatrical and musical past into the hotel's
design by painting many walls black,

Park Hyatt Vienna

For a stark contrast to Meliá, one needs only
to cross the river and check into the Park
Hyatt, which opened last June. Overlooking
Am Hof square, Park Hyatt occupies a
100-year-old former bank, a UNESCO World
Heritage Site in Vienna's first district. Colin
Finnegan of Amsterdam-based FG stijl was
brought in to develop the hotel's sumptuous
interiors and 143 guestrooms. "They wanted
a hotel that would not be just for now but
would be one of the best hotels for the next
100 years," Finnegan says. "What we tried to
do in the old bank was create the feeling that
this hotel was created 100 years ago for
the future."
Some areas of the structure were left
nearly original, including the former central
banking hall, which now houses all-day
restaurant the Bank, where guests dine
under restored stained-glass windows in a
grand, marble-clad space enhanced by four
glittering standing lamps. "When you think
Vienna, you think crystal, ballrooms, and
chandeliers, but in a bank building you can't
just hang chandeliers," Finnegan explains.
"We decided to create these four elements on
marble bases that are inspired by Vienna's
Secession Building."
New layouts were designed for the Park
Hyatt's rooms, with the exception of the
presidential suite, which was built in one
of the few remaining original rooms and
features four bookmarked slabs of lapis
lazuli covering an entire wall. "They only
find about eight of these slabs a year," says

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