Post-COVID Hospitality Industry Trend and its Impact on Hotel Interior Designs
COVID-19 pandemic had a devastating impact on the hospitality sector. Travel restriction and lockdown caused a chain reaction of plunging demand on service industries such as hotel, aviation and travel. As the world is turning towards a post-COVID era, the hospitality industry is beginning to revitalize gradually.
The unprecedented pandemic elevated people’s interest towards sanity and safety. The value of safe and hygienic space has become an essential factor in every hospitality sectors. In terms of hotel sector, hotel suppliers have recently been redesigning space that incorporates this guest expectation in this rapidly transforming era.
The most distinct changes in design are in the lobby, guest rooms, conference rooms, and banquet halls. Suppliers have been managing projects so that they can react quickly and flexibly to the rapidly changing consumer preference and external market conditions. Read out more to check out key highlights of hotel renovation trend in post-pandemic era, get inspired by the real-life applications!
Rising Trend of Integrated Lobby Space with Multifunctional Purpose
First key change of trend is on lobby space. Current direction for hotel lobby renovation is turning heads towards enhancing customer experience with touchless check-in/out/payment process. Along with the seamless customer experience, unlike traditional hotel lobby that merely served to check-in and collect room keys, it is transforming into a multifunctional space to enjoy a variety of F&B services such as meals, coffee, and cocktails, or to finish a simple work assignment.
The lobby offers increased productivity to business travelers, convenience for leisure travelers, and a bigger revenue to the hotel operators. The integrated hotel lobby design allows more flexible response to customers’ needs, and more competitive edge through the integration of bar, restaurant and lounge providing a spacious and pleasant F&B space.
HIMACS solid surface, a perfect material for hotel lobby space design
The lobby is a hotel’s first impression. It should be designed with materials that are both functional and aesthetically pleasing. HIMACS solid surface has been the top priority choice for hotel interior designers owing to its innumerous advantages. One great example is newly constructed Sky Lobby Bar located in the W Hotel in the heart of New York City.
The bar countertop offers a contemporary look featuring white leather seating squares and hanging lamps, and now serves as a popular destination for locals and hotel guests. The bar even features an outdoor seating area for guests to enjoy.
“The W Hotel desired a curved 3-D look for their bar countertop and you cannot accomplish that with traditional soft surface materials. Fortunately, through the use of LX Hausys’ HIMACS solid surface product, the hotel achieved the stunning look they were after,” said Jon Olson, communications manager at Sterling Surfaces, who served as the project installer.
The hotel lobby bar countertop construction took one month to complete and included knocking down the walls of the conventional lobby interior design to create an open concept lobby space. The project contractor selected LX Hausys HIMACS Black Spectrum as the main color for the bar tops due to its monolithic look.
HIMACS Acrylic Solid Surface products are thermoformable, meaning they can be designed in virtually any size or three-dimensional shape. HIMACS solid surface is stain resistant, easy to clean and hygienic making it easy to maintain for a high-traffic area like the W Hotel bar.
Guestroom and Bathroom Renovation Trend and Design Suggestions
Currently, there has been increasing needs of in-room gym and personal spa substituting the traditional swimming pool/fitness spaces. The root cause of this change can be explained by one of the most famous economists, Adam Smith’s writing on paradox of diamonds and water in his representative work, The Wealth of Nations (1776).
Diamonds, hard but sparkly, command a higher price than water, which is vital for survival, due to their scarcity. Likewise, the hotel should differentiate itself from the competitors by providing an unparalleled service to its guests. Hotel guestrooms are central to the guest experience and should maximize their experiential scarcity for increased guest satisfaction.
The increase in personal income and the spread of the global pandemic have made wellness more important than ever. Consequently, hotels are transforming their guest rooms. One example of differentiated value proposition includes creating a private fitness area by installing gym equipment such as weights and spinning bikes in the guest room or providing a private swimming pool.
HIMACS solid surface material adds a luxury to hotel guestroom and bathroom designs
Bizzarro & Partners and Alessia Galimberti Studio present Comfort Room, an exhibition project for the SIA Guest tradeshow in Rimini spotlighting finishing and materials. This hotel renovation exhibition project consists of an extremely elegant bedroom with a bathroom featuring HIMACS solid surface.
The concept will be exhibited in the Hotel Rooms area, a special initiative overseen by IEG together with Teamwork and bringing together the very best in hotel interior design. In particular, Comfort Room will form part of the “Rooms – SIA Hotel Design Lab” section, where a total of 12 full-size mockups of hotel rooms will be on display.
In creating the Comfort Room, originally intended to lead guests on a memorable emotional journey along the path of Italian style, the designers decided to use HIMACS Solid Surface in the bathroom. Wall claddings in the guestroom structures made with HIMACS solid surface material are resistant to scratches, cracks or ruptures and have excellent durability, which would allowing for easy maintenance.
HIMACS solid surface material is widely used in the building and refurbishment of hospitality facilities worldwide, and offers a perfect blend of technical and aesthetic properties to provide an indispensable way of breathing life into even the most ambitious and elaborate of ideas.
Hotel Kaktus Playa modernizes its hotel interior with HIMACS solid surface
Hotel Kaktus Playa, located in Calella on the Catalan coast, has modernized its hotel guestrooms and bathrooms to ensure its guests have a more relaxing and comfortable stay. The main aim was to give the rooms a contemporary, urban style, seeking to maximize guest comfort, using HIMACS solid surface material for all the furniture and eye-catching backlit wall cladding.
The hotel currently has 226 rooms, with additional services including a spa, heated pool, restaurant, and beach club. Looking to give the hotel an updated, modern look, architecture studio Byko was appointed to refurbish some of the hotel’s communal areas and the guest rooms. The architects opted for HIMACS acrylic surface in the guest bedrooms.
The layout and style of the rooms were a real challenge for the team of architects and designers, since they had to create standard, modern spaces that would not become obsolete over time. “We prioritized a hotel design that opts for interior visual spaciousness, functionality, and the feeling of comfort that we get at home,” says Ismael Fernández, building engineer and CEO of Byko.
Guest bathrooms and balcony area designed by seamless HIMACS solid surface mimic hotel spas where guests can relax. HIMACS solid surface allows hotel designers to realize their creative design ideas into reality thanks to its thermoformable quality. Playa hotel room’s wall cladding fabricated by HIMACS solid surface adds a soft and cozy feel to the room with its curvy shaped surfaces beautifully mingled with the background lighting.
Check out LX Hausys HIMACS solid surface collection and get inspirations for your own hospitality area interior design project.