AAA Adds Nine Hotels to Five Diamond List for 2012
AAA announced today the 126 lodgings that earned the AAA/CAA Five Diamond Award® designation for 2012. For hotels, a prevalent trend is creating a home-away-from-home environment, according to AAA inspectors. Another growth area is "smarter" hotel rooms that learn guests' habits as they use a central remote to control everything from heating and air to lights, curtains, music and wakeup calls.
Four Hotels you should check into on Foursquare
Location based marketing messages are becoming commonplace amongst travelers throughout the world. Foursquare is trailblazing a path amongst them and the Hotel world is beginning to catch on to the countless benefits of foursquare. We've chosen four Unique American Hotels that provide extreme luxury holidays with great foursquare offers: Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Miami, Hotel Max in Seattle, The Iron Horse Hotel in Milwaukee and The James Hotel in Chicago. Each hotel provides an exclusive foursquare offer that is easily claimed by simply Checking-in to the hotel via foursquare.
The Mandarin Oriental Hotel is situated in Brickell Miami and is the perfect hotel to enjoy a relaxing break whilst enjoying the exceptional Biscayne Bay views. The hotel is perfect for a lovely leisure holiday as well as a business break. It is fitted with all the requirements to thoroughly enjoy your time at the hotel, and has the only 5 star Spa in Florida. Foursquare offers of a free drink at Tapas at the poolside if you checked-in on a Friday between 7 and 11pm. Also, the Mandarin Oriental, Miami runs specials for their 2 restaurants, Azul and Cafe Sambal, and M-Bar (free first martini!) as well.
Mandarin Oriental Miami on Foursquare
Mandarin Oriental Miami on UWH
Similar offers are provided by the Iron Horse Hotel and The James. The Iron Horse Hotel is offering a foursquare special of a 50% discount for your first drink from a choice of two bars (Branded or The Lobby) for showing your server that you have checked-in on Foursquare at the hotel. The hotel is a 100-year-old warehouse converted to a beautiful boutique hotel and is the perfect place to enjoy a luxury holiday. The James also offers a deal regarding drinks where you will be provided two cocktails for the price of one.
Iron Horse on Foursquare
Iron Horse on UWH
The James Hotel on Foursquare
The James Hotel on UWH
Finally, Hotel Max. This hotel is the perfect hotel for relaxing and enjoying the works of fine photographers and artists as the hotel is located in the heart of Seattle. Hotel Max is offering something slightly different from the other 3 hotels already stated. When entering the hotel, why not show you have checked-in virtually and be entered into a chance to win a free stay?
Hotel Max on Foursquare
Hotel Max on UWH
These hotels have provided unique foursquare specials along with first class service. The offers are simple and easy to complete by joining foursquare and checking-in. Honorable Mention: The Ace Hotelin NYC, which is the most checked-into hotel on foursquare...to date.
Ace Hotel on Foursquare
Ace Hotel on UWH
*Foursquare specials amongst all hotels mentioned are subject to change any time.*
Hyatt and Extell unveil plans for Park Hyatt New York
The recently announced Park Hyatt New York will be a newly-constructed hotel designed by world-renowned, Pritzker Prize-winning architect Christian de Portzamparc, with interiors by Yabu Pushelberg.
Hip hotels around the world
London is the epicentre of 2011 launch activity, as hoteliers race to be ready for the 2012 Olympics, the most exciting of which is the re-opening of Midland Grand hotel, as the St Pancras Renaissance Hotel. With interiors by David Collins and GA International, 38 of the hotel's 245 rooms will be in the original redbrick building, restored with goldleaf ceilings, ornate wall murals and 50ft-high windows surrounding its breathtaking grand staircase.
Good-bye, Hotel Front Desk
With the emergence of a younger class of business travelers, hotels are ditching a mainstay - the front desk. The hotel front desk has a long and honorable, even cinematic, tradition of service. Would Hitchcock's North by Northwest be as witty if Cary Grant hadn't urbanely sparred with an officious front-desk clerk at Chicago's Ambassador East?
Move over Mobil Guide! (UWH featured in May/June 2010 issue of The Atlantan)
Those who know their Ettore Sottsass from their Eero Saarinen don't want to lay their heads down on just any hotel bed. Enter www.UniqueWorldHotels.com, a new Web site that handpicks the best designer hotels throughout the globe so you can bed down without betraying your aesthetics.
Read the full article on Page 30
Hotel Missoni, Edinburgh
When the Hotel Missoni opened its doors in Edinburgh, Scotland, in early 2009, lovers of the Italian fashion house's signature zigzag prints will be afforded the chance to sleep on Missoni-initialed sheets, eat off of Missoni plates and even swig a cocktail at the Missoni bar. With brilliant ideas Missoni is just the latest fashion company to jump into the hotel business. Since 2000, more than a dozen designers have either partnered with a hospitality company to co-brand a new property or signed on to redesign the interiors of an existing hotel.
"In the last five or 10 years, fashion designers have begun to understand that the best way they can increase business is by recreating themselves as lifestyles brands," says Lucian James, founder of Paris-based brand consultancy Agenda. "They have to find other ways to build revenue in an increasingly competitive global marketplace."
Read the full article Book Now
The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company, will open its first hotel in Israel
The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company has announced plans for its first property in Israel at the marina in Herzliya, a coastal suburb just north of Tel Aviv. Due to open in March 2012, the 110-room hotel will also include 85 Ritz-Carlton Residential Suites.
Read the full article
Four Seasons opens in Florence, Italy
Some first-time visitors to Florence have been known to suffer from Stendhal syndrome - often referred to as Florence Syndrome - which is named after the 19th-century French novelist. As a result of prolonged proximity to such "sublime beauty", he was overcome with an extreme case of nerves and palpitations. You could be forgiven for having your own Stendhal moment at the Four Seasons.
Read the full article Book Now