Welcome to our guide to the very best hotels and hotel designers. We aim to review, comment and critique the latest, most luxurious hotel designs. To bring you the latest interviews and discussions with most influential designers in the industry, as well as the latest product designs to grace their walls, rooms and balconies. Ranging from bar designs through to cityscape views, X2 aims to bring you the very latest in global hotel design whilst outlining the inspiration and motivation behind each project. Please feel free to send us your comments, opinions and experiences. We hope you enjoy our website.

My word, the interiors of this hotel are different! With each of the 26 guest rooms taking a letter instead of a number, and that letter referring to a famous author whose work is hand-stencilled on to the walls, it’s possible to lie in bed and have a good read with-out even opening a book…

Interior Designer : Didier Benderli

One of Paris’s latest additions to its portfolio of chic and characterful hotels, Le Pavillon Des Lettres is an expondent of the luxury boutique hotel, but with a novel concept.

Designer Didier Benderli from Parisian practice Kerylos Intérieurs has used the letters of the alphabet and great authors and poets as inspiration for the hotel’s 26 guest rooms.

There are no room numbers at Le Pavillon Des Lettres, just a letter on each door, and each room takes inspiration from a famous author – from Hans Christian Andersen to Émile Zola – featuring quotes from French and international authors written on the walls in French.

‘The design and decor can be thought of as similar to the syntax of a sentence or a story, with rhymes, chapters, pauses, acceleration – a short story being told,’ says Benderli.

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Paris-born Didier Benderli studied architecture at UP8 and History of Art at the Sorbonne. After his studies, he left for South America where he worked on a number of projects, mostly in Brazil. In 1989 he joined Agence Jacques Garcia, where he worked as artistic director for 12 years. In 2001 he set up his own business, Agence Kerylos Interieurs. Le Pavillon Des Lettres is the fifth hotel in the practice’s portfolio, which also includes furniture and lighting designs.

With so many legendary writers to chose from, how did you reach the final 26?
It was a combination of my own personal taste and wanting to cover the global literary landscape by choosing international writers. And the ones we chose had to evoke our themes, which are dreams, travels and the night. Also the extracts we chose had to physically sit well on the walls and spaces available – lines from a poem, play or text are an integral part of the design in every room – they are hand-stencilled above the bed. (continue reading…)

A proven appreciation of architectural and cultural heritage and a seasoned eye for contemporary design has seen MKV design help Bern’ s iconic schweizerhof hotel move gracefully into the 21st century

Interior designer: Maria Vafiadis, MKV Design

Nearly 100 years after the Schweizerhof opened as Bern’s first luxury hotel, it has undergone a multimillion pound refurbishment and redesign and has re-emerged to reclaim its crown with contemporary design complementing the traditional splendour of this world-famous hotel. (continue reading…)

MKV is one of the most respected companies providing world-class interior design to the international hospitality sector. Its portfolio of projects reflects a wide diversity of design talent encompassing chic urban hotels, grand historic establishments, revitalised businesses and leisure hotels and large-scale, new-build resorts. It has a commitment of originality and integrity, understanding and respecting local architectural and cultural inheritance while reinterpreting them afresh to meet each client’s objectives. The company was founded in 1999 by Maria Vafiadis, who had previously studied architecture in Milan and worked there as well as in Vienna and Athens before moving to London. One of the most widely travelled and cosmopolitan hotel designers working out of London today, she is fluent in five European languages.

How did MKV Design secure this project? Bruno Schoepfer who heads the Qatari Diar division for Switzerland (Qatari Diar is the hotel owner) was staying at a lifestyle city centre hotel that we had recently designed in Vienna at the time he was planning the renovation of his hotel. He liked it! (continue reading…)

Contemporary design, modern art and intriguing installations meet red, the traditional Chinese symbol of luck and happiness, in this striking hotel design

Interior Designer: GA Design International

As guests arrive at W Taipei they cannot fail to notice the mirror-finished, stainless-steel sculpture, appropriately named The Chain ‘holding’ the hotel to the ground. Stepping inside the hotel, which has been designed by London-based architecture practice GA Design International, more intriguing artwork is on display, this time an interactive light installation called You Fade to Light, by rAndom International.

W Taipei’s 405 guest rooms and suites are designed with warm-coloured stone, burnished wood and floral carpeting, a contrast with modern, subtle lighting inspired by Chinese lantern boxes. The rooms feature interior balconies or ‘playpads’ as they are called by the design team, plus modern white workstations with ergonomically sound task chairs in leather. Oversized vacation-style islander tubs can be found in the bathrooms, set against red or chartreuse-coloured, subway-inspired, wall tiles and a wooden partition. (continue reading…)

Turkish tradition meets contemporary design aesthetics in the latest instalment of the edition story, creatively directed by American hotelier and inventor of the boutique-hotel concept Ian Schrager

Architect & Interior designer: Gabellini Sheppard Associates
Creative adviser: Ian Schrager

Following the instant success of The Waikiki Edition, new luxury lifestyle hotel brand Edition has made its European debut in Istanbul. As the first European Edition hotel, The Istanbul Edition could not be more different from its Waikiki sister, while at the same time continuing to demonstrate the brand’s unexpected and refreshing collection of individual hotels that aim to be the antithesis of an institutional ‘hotel chain’.

New York-based design consultancy Gabellini Sheppard Associates was commissioned to design The Istanbul Edition in a branded collaboration between hotelier Ian Schrager and Marriott International that represents the next generation of international boutique hotels. (continue reading…)

The graceful and sweeping arc of the facade of the Move Hotel informs the interiors, as does the tranquil countryside in which this low-rise building nestles

Architect: DHK Architects
Interior designer: Marco Piva
Interior designer (Restaurant and Bar): Studio Bam Design

Sober elegance, natural materials and inviting spaces set the tone at the new Move Hotel at Mogliano Veneto.

The innovative hotel structure created by DHK Architects in collaboration with the Marco Piva Studio is strategically located just a few kilometers from the Mestre by-pass and the airports of Venice and Treviso, immersed in the tranquil countryside of Trevigiano and surrounded by Venetian villas.

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Architect and designer Marco Piva was a cofounder of Studiodada Associates in 1978, one of the leading design offices of the Radical period. Studio Marco Piva opened in 1984, becoming a multidisciplinary practice for architecture, interior, product and industrial design and exhibitions.

He develops projects all over the world, and realizes residential and tourist facilities for developers and tourist operators worldwide.

In 2001 Piva established Atelier Design, a design cell within his own practice, where research and development are the fundamental keys of design. Since 1999 Piva has combined his practice work with teaching at universities and design institutes both in Italy and abroad, and the organisation of the MA programmes at the Politecnico di Milano, Polytechnic School of Design and the Istituto Europeo di Design in Milan. (continue reading…)

The latest instalments of the HI family of hotels has seen a total contrast of offering – futuristic lodgings in Paris and a sanctuary in the Tunisian Desert. But both are united by the philosophy of the unique design talent of their creator

Architect & Interior Designer: Matali Crasset

HI matic Paris is the latest offering in a unique series of eco lodgings designed by Matali Crasset, in collaboration with hoteliers Patrick Elouarghi and Philippe Chapelet.

This urban branch of the HI family follows the launch of the concept in 2003 with HI Nice, and Dar HI in Tunisia, which was unveiled at the end of last year.

Totally internet based, HI Paris is geared to be automatic, hence the name. Void of all traditional concierge and staff, a unique code issued at the time of booking online gives guests access to the building and to computers where they check in, pay and receive their room key, all on their own. (continue reading…)

Matali Crasset trained as an industrial designer. She began working with Denis Santachiara and then with Philippe Starck. She quickly set up her own studio, through which she harmonises her principles of life, work and her visions of the future. All her projects follow a singular approach enabling her to work in a wide range of areas including interior architecture, stage design, industrial design, furniture, graphic design, exhibitions and art direction. She has also been made Knight of the Order of Merit by the French government.

The three Hi properties so far – HI Nice, Hi matic and Dar HI – have completely different settings and feels – bustling Paris, magical Nefta, seaside Nice. What is the unifying philosophy behind them? (continue reading…)