Poland Hotels Booking

Spacious, cool and clutter-free, the Grand Hotel Central melds the scale and efficiency of a business hotel with the textures and colors of a city-center boutique hotel. The minimalist-chic design looks immediately familiar, immaculately clean and gracefully illuminated, but is confidently handled, and finishes lengths ahead of the average minimalist boutique. And the location elevates it as well: the proximity to Barcelona’s cathedral and the Gothic quarter makes it tourist-friendly, and the arty El Born district which surrounds is the natural habitat of the young and stylish.

Inside it’s well-equipped for business or pleasure; each of the 147 guest rooms features crisp white linens, spotless glass doors, a large flat-screen television, high-speed internet access, and conveniences like an oversized work desk, a hands-free telephone, and ruthlessly efficient soundproofing. Luxurious bathrooms contain anti-steam mirrors and roomy bathtubs. And fully half of the guest quarters are actually rather extravagant, either expanded Executive rooms or full-fledged suites, with high ceilings and huge windows facing out to the cathedral.

Tart sangria and Catalan-inspired lunches are served in Actual, the hotel’s stylish restaurant. The rooftop’s sparkling blue infinity pool, however, may be the hotel’s most notable feature, as the panoramic views of ancient monuments and the contemporary city-dwellers that bustle around them are truly unmatched in Barcelona.

Located in the north tower of the brand-new, $1.7bn Time Warner Center on Columbus Circle, the Mandarin Oriental brings Far East hospitality to America’s hottest hotel market. The Asian influence is apparent at a glance, with wood paneling, marble everywhere, and clean Zen-influenced design. And even the hotel’s placement, occupying twenty stories near the top of a mixed-use skyscraper, mirrors the situation of Tokyo’s grandest luxury hotels — the Mandarin Oriental New York is directly connected to the Time Warner shopping center, and piggybacks atop office and retail spaces to maximize views of the Hudson and Central Park (though the Trump Tower edges in on the action).

This is one of the only big business hotels in New York with a contemporary look — the guest rooms are sleek, minimal, with stylish modern furniture. But the most remarkable design choice is the inclusion of floor-to-ceiling windows — corner rooms, especially, seem suspended in air high above midtown Manhattan, offering a view that’s hard to match in New York’s more traditional luxury hotels. The fittings are as modern as the furnishings, with high-speed internet, in-room laptop charging safes, and flat-screen TVs in bedrooms and bathrooms. And those bathrooms are an attraction unto themselves, with separate marble baths and enclosed showers, and, in suites, vast picture windows affording bathers views of the Hudson and the park.

The only potential drawback is the price. Upon opening, the Mandarin Oriental made headlines with the most expensive hotel suite in this already expensive city — the Presidential Suite, a palatial plate glass wonder, will set you back by the price of a modest mid-sized automobile for each night. But there’s always room at the top, and if there is a place for such an upscale hotel, New York is it. The facilities are top of the class, and the service, while perhaps less obsequious than that in the Far East Mandarins, is among the city’s best. Don’t take our word — travelers vote with their dollars, and have been doing so consistently since its late 2003 opening.

The brand-new Palacio Duhau Park Hyatt was met with a bit more enthusiasm than the typical big-chain luxury hotel. It’s at the same time an homage to the glory days of Buenos Aires, a Thirties mansion (from which it takes the first part of its name) connected to a modern tower. It splits the difference between the all-antique Alvear Palace (which is just blocks away) and the newer crop of modern design hotels, and all accompanied by characteristic Park Hyatt luxuries and the sort of highly professional service that’s still, like it or not, largely the province of the big international chains.

Whether in the old mansion or the new tower, the guest rooms are afforded plenty of space to spread out in, and the bathrooms are sprawling to match — every one with a tub, separate shower, and a walk-in closet. And while the style’s far from challenging it is refreshingly contemporary; palace rooms pay some homage to the building’s Thirties style while the tower rooms have a touch of the minimal about them.

Comforts are legion outside the rooms as well. The Duhau restaurant and the Oak Bar are local fixtures, the business facilities are top-class, and the spa is the most extensive in town, with an 80-foot swimming pool and a menu of treatments that must be at least half that long.

You’d expect the top-flight business hotels in Frankfurt, the financial center of Germany, to be skyscraperish modern glass-and-metal affairs. And quite often you’d be right. The Villa Kennedy, though, is something a bit different. Though it’s a high-end modern business hotel, like the other Rocco Forte hotels it’s a high-end modern business hotel inhabiting a thoroughly renovated historic building — in this case a distinctly un-skyscraperish century-old villa just south of the Main, on the residential side of Frankfurt, surrounded by museums rather than corporate headquarters.

What you get, then, is the best of both worlds: the sedate pleasures of villa life, complete with courtyard and manicured gardens, along with all the comforts of the modern luxury hotel. It’s an expansion, not just a renovation, so guests have the choice of traditionally-styled rooms in the old villa, or more contemporary ones in the new addition. Either way, they’re spacious, stylish, and lacking no convenience. Business travelers will appreciate the extensive meeting facilities, and everyone benefits from the full-service spa and fitness center. The Gusto restaurant and the JFK Bar are for dealmaking, not scenemaking — which, in a hotel like this, is rather as it should be.

Possibly the most luxe of Toronto’s new crop of luxury boutiques, the Hazelton is a sign of the times: both high-design, with interiors by the ubiquitous Canadian firm Yabu Pushelberg, and unashamedly high-end, with suites averaging six hundred square feet and outfitted with all the latest luxury trimmings, from iPod docking stations to heated bathroom floors and flush mirror-mounted television screens. It’s meant to be a modern grand hotel, a contemporary version of what places like the Savoy in London or the Waldorf-Astoria in New York must have once been. And with a little luck that’s exactly what it’ll be.

The private screening room does a brisk business come film-festival season, and the hotel’s spa and health club, complete with indoor pool, is a big draw year-round. The same can be said of the One restaurant, and the bar is buzzing as a modern hotel bar must be — weather permitting, the scene spills out onto the street-level patio. Add a Yorkville location that could hardly be hipper or more high-profile, and you’ve got the formula for an instant classic, a hotel that’s at once cool enough for your generation and swanky enough for your parents’.

For anyone tired out by the unrelenting tackiness of the neon-lit Times Square, there’s an alternative, this one in basic black. The Night Hotel, a new addition on West 45th between Sixth and Seventh, is, adjusting for the neighborhood, the model of fashionable composure, from the monochrome checks of the lobby floor to the black-and-white Gothic chic of the perversely cozy bedrooms.

And this being Times Square, of course, it’s ever so slightly over the top. This isn’t monochrome-as-minimalism, in a downtown style, but more a black velvet fantasy, a romantic evocation of a darker, more glamorous Gotham. It’s a smallish hotel, less than a hundred rooms, and like most New York hotel rooms, they’re not overly large. They are, however, well-appointed, with plasma TVs, iPod stereo systems, and generous creature comforts, including 400-thread-count Frette sheets and Molton Brown bath products, which probably matter more to the Night’s amorous clientele than, say, full-sized work desks — though the latter, one imagines, might find themselves drafted into improvised service too.

There’s a restaurant, called Nightlife (what else?) — though, to be fair, this being Manhattan, there’s a lot more nightlife to be had outside the hotel’s walls. Just don’t be surprised if you find all that colored light a little hard to take, after a night or two at the Night.

Too many foreign visitors never see more of Japan than Tokyo plus maybe a quick jaunt to Osaka or at most Kyoto. But it pays, when seeking out a new travel destination, to find out where the locals go on holiday. And in the Japan’s case, one of the answers is Kyushu, the most southwestern of the four main islands — here the climate is milder, almost tropical, and on the north end the mountains and valleys are traded in for calm seas and sandy beaches.

Here, in a seaside park twenty minutes from Fukuoka city, is where you’ll find the Luigans, a hotel that’s seemingly designed to confound your expectations of what Japan can be. All ninety-eight rooms face Hakata bay, and are decorated in one of two schemes: a simple white minimalist look or a slightly colonial, rattan-and-ceiling-fan theme. There’s plenty of space and plenty of creature comforts, from luxurious towels, linens and robes to rare Italian-made Acca Kappa toiletries, and a mini-fridge full of complimentary drinks. And though outdoor opportunities abound — public parks, golf courses, the beach, the bay — you’re a short drive from the city center, and less than a half hour from the airport.

The Principe is the grandaddy of Milan hotels—ostentatious and slightly fraying, with a staff of elderly men who seem to have worked there since the beginning of time. It’s easy to imagine that it’s stayed the same for the last hundred years—crystal chandeliers in the lobby, ornate antique chests of drawers in the bedrooms, and bathrooms with many bidets. Room service is wheeled in by a waiter who is the essence of courtesy—with white linen tablecloths, silver trays, a single flower in a bud vase, cutlery that is unwieldy and ancient. Nick the olive oil, by the way (easier to do in your room than in the restaurant), which is pressed especially for the Principe and simply sublime. The only incongruous element is the gym and spa on floor ten. Still, with its up-to-date equipment, massive indoor pool, and best beauticians in the city, no one’s complaining.

You will sleep well at the Principe—these glamorously old-fashioned four-poster beds boast some of the softest linens in Europe. Should you have trouble falling asleep without Fifi by your side, rest assured, they let you bring your pets. Hungry? The restaurant downstairs, Acanto, stays open until the wee hours of the morning.

There’s another thing—the people. Though it’s a cab ride away from the sights and the shopping, the Principe is nonetheless considered to be one of the most central places in the city to rendezvous. Stunning locals rub shoulders with young families having supper with their priests.

And then there are the celebrities—Sophia Loren, Courtney Love, Ben Affleck, Gisele Bundchen and everyone in between. Hang out by the concierge desk—especially during fashion week—and catch the gossip, and keep an eye out for which ridiculously enormous bouquets of flowers are arriving for whom. It also makes working out here a treat, since you can check out Gwyneth Paltrow’s time on the treadmill. If you pay enough attention, you may even scoop the latest breakup or business deal. Old and venerable as the Principe may be, the people who come to visit are a living Page Six.

Siena is, on the one hand, a time machine, a meticulously preserved medieval city, known for its artworks and architecture, and ever-popular with travelers of all nationalities. But people live here too; and alongside its medieval fortifications and Renaissance palazzos is a thriving boutique and cafe culture to rival any of Italy’s modern cities.

Today’s Grand Hotel Contintental is Siena’s top luxury hotel, and the only hotel of its kind in the heart of the city, just off the pedestrian-only Piazza del Campo. The building was converted from a grand aristocratic residence, the seventeenth-century Palazzo Gori, and has been restored and refurbished — but not redesigned. All of the original details remain, the frescoes are brighter than ever, and the ballroom is as grand as it must have been three hundred years ago.

The rooms are every bit as opulent as the public spaces, each one individually designed, with frescoed or beamed ceilings, terracotta floors, and period artworks and furnishings — though modern touches like internet access and satellite TV make this a modern hotel. The restaurant, Sapordovino, is splendidly set beneath the palazzo’s glass-domed courtyard, and the wine bar is a surprisingly stylish option. The only caveat, owing to the space restrictions in Siena’s historic downtown — though the hotel does offer such niceties as a swimming pool and tennis courts, these are actually a short shuttle ride away, at the Grand Hotel Continental’s sister property on the outskirts of town.