Online - August 27, 2005

Artful Lodgers

Art Hotels Around the World

Remember when diaphanous white curtains and mile-long lobby bars set your heart aflutter at check-in? Such innocent times. These days it takes a lot more to get jaded jet-setters excited about hotel design. Here’s a look at the coolest and highest-concept spots that’ll have you reaching for your passport.

Hotel Paella
Twenty leading designers worked on Madrid’s Hotel Puerta America. Collaboration at its best? Hell, no. Each had a space, resulting in a veritable chocolate box for insatiable design snobs: Should you stay on Marc Newson’s Floor 6 or Zaha Hadid’s Floor 1?
Critics rave: Spectacular. Sexy. Futuristic.

Soul Plane
Mind-blowing interactive art installations in the lounge bar ensure that no one is ever bored at the W Seoul Walkerhill in South Korea. Daniel Rozin’s Wooden Mirror is a wall of hundreds of blocks that tilt to reflect whatever comes before it.
Critics rave: Ultramod innovation for neon tigers.

Caliente Casita
Pucker up for Boquitas Pintadas (“little painted lips”) in Buenos Aires, a six-room art supermarket/hotel that video, graffiti, and visual artists redecorate every few months. Spencer Tunick did a naked installation here, but you can keep your clothes on. (Or not.)
Critics rave: Cool, with a dose of hot sauce.

The Sands of Time
Entertaining desert fantasies? The Kuwait Hotel, opening at the end of the year, is a modern retreat that literally sits below the country’s sands. The space, which was designed by Sybarite, has a courtyard dome of rainbows. (No website yet, but click here and select “project 042.”)
Critics rave: Desert daydream for sun lovers.

Le Sleek, C’est Pas Chic
The French may do Nice’s clubby Hi Hotel in the summer, but the rest of the year they get their debauched glamour in Paris at Hotel du Petit Moulin, a former Marais bakery redone by designer Christian Lacroix. Cue a crazy explosion of stripes, voile, and paintings.
Critics rave: A living dollhouse of pop art pleasure.

  Luxury Travel, Scenesters