London: Firmdale Hotels Open Their Newest Hotel in London, Dorset Square

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Firmdale Hotels Open Their Newest Hotel in London, Dorset Square

While its new flagship London property is still under construction and not expected until sometime next year, Firmdale Hotels threw open the doors of its Dorset Square Hotel for guests this month.

The seventh Firmdale hotel in the city, it joins the Covent Garden Hotel (a fashionista favorite) and the celebrity-friendly Soho Hotel, as well as Crosby Street Hotel in New York.

Set on the leafy square from which it takes its name, the hotel is close to Marylebone High Street, just north of Oxford Street and the famous West End. Being the site of Thomas Lord's first cricket ground, cricket is a theme you will see throughout the hotel, including the logo of two cricket bats and a ball.

With only 38 rooms spread over the floors of a Regency-era townhouse, Dorset Square is very much that: a townhouse hotel, which you'll experience from the airy ground floor drawing room to the twisting hallways and individual rooms upstairs.

We'll have more on what's inside the hotel next week, but fans of Kit Kemp's signature style - pops of color, bold fabrics, and lots of texture - will feel right at home. Don't be surprised if you end up wandering around touching sofas, chairs, even wallpaper to (literally) get a sense of all the different elements that make up your room and the public spaces.

Guests will have access to the private park opposite the hotel, with rooms facing the park coming in at a small premium. We actually liked some of the rooms tucked in the back of the hotel though; if you prefer your hotel stay to feel like a long weekend at an (arguably very wealthy) relative, that's the kind of vibe you can find here.

In addition to the drawing room with honesty bar, there is The Potting Shed restaurant on the lower ground floor, with separate access at street level. Entering the restaurant from outside, you'll head down a staircase with a sharp left turn, descending between the facade of the hotel and the sidewalk. Glass panels overhead bridge the restaurant, housed inside the actual hotel, and the bar, which is literally underneath the sidewalk and the street, with cozy booths in the arches of what used to be the cellar.

Stay tuned for more up close and personal details on the Dorset Square hotel next week!

Want to book a room? Superior rooms start from ?195 ($304) excluding VAT, but don't bank on much availability once the Olympics are in town.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Hotelchatter/~3/V7J7EDnsB1c/52397

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