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Hotel La Tour Birmingham showround February 2012
I have been treated to a ‘hard hat’ showround of the new Hotel La Tour in Birmingham. Hotel la Tour is the new four star hotel opening 26th March in central Birmingham. The name ‘Hotel la Tour’ in art-deco style lettering had just been attached to the outside of the black-glass clad, wedge -shaped building which does help locating it – not that it is a problem.
Hotel la Tour is just 200 metres from Birmingham Moor Street Station and only a five minute walk from New Street Station. It is a flagship hotel for Birmingham’s regenerated Eastside. The hotel is still a building site at the moment but will be ready on time.
Hotel La Tour Birmingham – the facts:
Bedrooms – 174 in total comprising City Rooms: 24sq m with floor to ceiling windows and great city views, air conditioned, touch screen controls for lighting and temperature, media hub with full connectivity to laptops, smart phones and mp3 players, bathrooms with walk-in shower but no bathtub; Executive rooms: the same size but more luxuriously equipped and with even better views and Suites: at 33 sq m with a lounge area plus a bathtub.
Conferences: there are nine modular style meeting rooms on a dedicated ‘business floor’ with its own reception and refreshment area. Rooms have loads of natural daylight and a good shape. Maximum capacity is around 140 delegates theatre style but it will be hosting the boardroom style meetings and smaller gatherings/private dinners where it will really score.
Aalto is the hotel restaurant. It is also wedge-shaped with an open kitchen. Chef Marcus Wareing, inspired the restaurant concept and menus, and Hotel La Tour Birmingham have just announced the appointment of their Head Chef - Alex Penhaligon.
Full details: www.hotel-latour.co.uk
What are Hotel La Tour Birmingham’s USP’s?
1. The hotel is on its own in Birmingham’s Eastside – most of the four star hotels in the city are on the Broad Street side of the city. It is a short walk to the business district around Snow Hill and it is on the M6 side of the city centre.
2. There will be a wedge-shaped roof garden above the second level of the hotel facing west with views over the city which should be wonderful on a summer’s evening.
3. The hotel does have a wow-factor. It reminded me of the former City Inns – simply decorated yet very stylish, loads of natural daylight, the latest technology in the bedrooms, meetings rooms and reception. They will also be a ‘living wall’ in the café/lounge – now where have I seen that before?
4. Hotel la Tour Birmingham is the kind of hotel which will ‘suck you inside to have a look’. The ground floor is open and inviting with a café lounge, bar and probably a ‘real buzz’. The road alongside has been pedestrianized and I suspect the hotel’s catering operation will expand to fill it with tables and chairs.
5. There is an open-air car park facing the hotel between it and Moor Street Station. The car park is earmarked as the site for the new HS2 high-speed rail terminal in Birmingham but I suspect it will remain a car park for a few years yet.
I think Hotel la Tour will be a great addition to Birmingham’s stock of hotels and should prove very popular. My thanks to Grace for the showround and for arranging all the safety gear one has to wear on building sites these days.
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A weekend in Scotland with Principal Hayley Hotels - Sally
January 2012
After a short one hour flight from Birmingham to Glasgow, we were chauffeur-driven into town to the Principal Hayley Grand Central Hotel, adjacent to Glasgow’s Central Station.
This was a Principal-Hayley event to celebrate the 1st anniversary of the re-opening of the Grand
 Central Hotel after a £20m refurbishment programme transforming it into one of Glasgow's historic and superior, conference, banqueting and short break destinations that once again takes its place as Glasgow's leading four-star hotel.
Picture: What better way to start the weekend than with a glass of champagne in Champagne Central overlooking Central Station concourse.
We joined the anniversary celebrations for a charity ball in the Grand Room enjoying a 3 course meal and wine before retiring for the evening.
The following morning we were shown round the conference facilities and on departure were
 presented with a book on the history of the hotel, before our coach drive to Edinburgh where we checked into the 4 star George Hotel, Principal-Hayley’s flagship hotel ideally located on George Street in the Scottish capital.
(picture: Panorama Suite at the George Hotel)
In the afternoon, we joined the city bus tour of Edinburgh before joining the General Manager for pre-dinner drinks and dinner in the Panorama Lounge, located on the 5th floor with panoramic views down to the River Forth and beyond.
Sunday morning was at leisure before our departure to Edinburgh Airport and our flight back to Birmingham
The Principal-Hayley Grand Central Hotel in Glasgow has 21 meeting rooms from the Grand Ballroom which seats up to 400 people to boardrooms of 10 people, and 186 bedrooms
The Principal Hayley George Hotel in Edinburgh has been voted Best Hotel in Edinburgh at the Scottish Hotel Awards 2011. The Kings Hall, located on the ground floor can seat 300 delegates, while the Panorama Suite on the 5th floor with 16 bedrooms on the same floor, makes an ideal setting for small private events
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Site visit: Hilton London Heathrow Airport Terminal 5: Sally and Tracy January 2012
 The 14th HBAA Annual Dinner was held in early January at the newly opened Hilton London Heathrow Airport Terminal 5. Sally and Tracy went along for the Dinner and also to check out the new hotel. Here are their thoughts
.
Leaving the office an hour late was not the best of starts but as maybe some people had not taken to the roads being Friday 13th January meant we made excellent progress down the M40 to the Hilton London Heathrow Airport Terminal 5. The hotel is not actually located at Terminal 5 and our sat-nav did not like the postcode given, but nevertheless we located the hotel without too much trouble. First impressions – plenty of car parking – undercover and open air so no problems in quickly finding a parking space. The hotel is set within 13 acres of landscaped grounds. The Heathrow Hoppa bus services the hotel to all terminals on a regular basis.
 A warm welcome awaited us with a quick check-in and then into our bedrooms. There are 350 bedrooms which are a good size with a large bathroom and facilities. There is complimentary wi-fi throughout the hotel.
The pre-dinner drinks for 380 guests were served in the foyer area of the main Gallery Suite, where we were led through for a delicious three-course dinner. Entertainment followed.
Breakfast, the following morning was slick with an excellent choice including the traditional Hilton omelettes cooked to order. It was served in the Gallery Restaurant although the adjacent Mr Todiwala’s Kitchen was set up for any overflow should it have been required.
After breakfast we went and looked at Mr Todiwala’s Kitchen which serves a host of fragrant and delicious pan-Indian specialities. The Chef, Cyrus Todiwal, brings his signature dishes from his landmark restaurant in the city, Café Spice Namaste, to be enjoyed in this stylish and colonial contemporary restaurant/kitchen.
Musetti’s Coffee Shop serves a variety of coffees and drinks, along with freshly made sandwiches or toasted paninis. We were sorely tempted by a variety of muffins, cakes and pastries.
We were given a showround and saw the several smaller meeting rooms on the ground floor including two boardrooms. The ground floor rooms have a dedicated business centre and a refreshment break out area. All the rooms on the ground floor have natural daylight.
The main Gallery Suite on the first floor seats 1170 theatre style or 800 guests for a banquet, together with 350sqm of pre-event space.
Hilton London Heathrow Airport Terminal 5 also includes a 24-hour Fitness Centre and luxury Spa with sauna.
Does Heathrow Airport need yet another hotel? On the basis of our experience at Hilton London Heathrow Airport Terminal 5 the answer is yes – if they are as good as this.
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Site visit: Hotel Indigo Birmingham - Sally December 2011
 Drive up to the front door of the Hotel Indigo Birmingham and park in the ‘drive-in’ bay. Go into the ground floor reception and ask to park your car, provided you are a resident that is. Reception will give you a token and then you drive down a ramp at the side of the hotel into what looks like a cage.
Then lock your car and make sure you have every piece of luggage you are likely to require for your stay with you - there is no return visit. Close the gate and watch as your vehicle slowly disappears from sight underground. Your car is totally secure even if you’re not absolutely convinced that you will ever see it again. Such fun and that is before you even get to your room.
 Hotel Indigo is part of the IHG roster of hotel brands. In the past I have taken clients to view three Indigo hotels, two in London (at Paddington and Tower Gateway) and the new one in Liverpool. Although Indigo claims to be a boutique and individual hotel concept, nevertheless you do expect an ‘Indigo look’. If it does exist I am not aware of it, apart from the free flowing primary colours. There isn’t much ‘beige’ at Hotel indigo. Each Hotel Indigo has its own theme. In Birmingham it is ‘cubes’ because of its location in the Cube Building in the fashionable Mailbox development. Hence you have a reception carpet with coloured squares with cube shaped pictures on the wall.
 There are only 52 bedrooms at the Hotel Indigo Birmingham and they are located on floors 23 and 24 of the Cube. All the bedrooms are very contemporary with laminate flooring. Floor to ceiling windows ensure they are fabulously bright and airy and with wonderful views. Bedroom soft furnishing offers a choice of blue, lime green/yellow, orange and purple. The suites have their own private terrace as well. What else – all bedrooms feature a walk-in monsoon showers but no bath. The rooms are equipped with the usual flat screen television and wi-fi is complimentary throughout the hotel. They are all double-bedded and no cheating with ‘zip and link’ beds either.
A fitness club with a gym and treatment rooms plus a city spa will be opening later this month on the lower ground floors of the hotel.
 On the 25th floor is the Marco Pierre White Steakhouse, Bar and Grill restaurant. If the food matches the 360 degree panoramic city view it will be brilliant. There is also a Champagne Bar about to open on the same floor. Both the restaurant and the Champagne Bar are available for private hire, and so is the rooftop terrace garden which links them. There is a private dining room on the same floor for around 20 guests which can be used as a boardroom during the day – or when there is no private dining.
The Mailbox is only a smallish shopping centre, albeit a very trendy one, overlooking the canals of central Birmingham and surrounded by modern apartment blocks. Nonetheless the Hotel Indigo Birmingham is the third hotel to open in the complex – joining the Malmaison Birmingham and the Ramada Birmingham City. From the top floor we could clearly identify a further half dozen three and four star hotels almost within touching distance. So Hotel Indigo Birmingham has competition – but it is very different from the other city centre properties and a welcome addition to the Birmingham hotel scene.
Now then - how do you rescue your car from the car park? Ask the very friendly concierge and he will give you a guide on his smart phone.
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Site Visit: Drayton Manor Hotel - Sally November 2011
If I was given ‘carte blanche’ to build a hotel in what I considered to be the best location in Britain, I
 would pick a spot in the Midlands. I would look close to the M6, the M6 Toll and the M42 with proximity to a mainline station and preferably an airport as well. I would also look for a solid industrial commercial base in the immediate area.
That said I have to admit that one of my short-listed locations has already been snapped up - by Drayton Manor Hotel. I went to have a look at what my dream location would look like with a new four star hotel now in-situ. My first impression was of a modern castle.
 There was another reason for my visit. Drayton Manor Hotel is on the same site as Drayton Manor Theme Park in Tamworth. Whilst I can see the advantages for a hotel operator building a hotel at a theme park in that they get the best of both worlds – corporate business in the week and the leisure business over weekends and holidays – I am not always convinced it works for the corporate market. I took a good client along with me for her input.
 Drayton Manor Hotel is a modern 150 bedroom contemporary styled hotel to suit modern tastes. It is typical of the modern hotels which have been opening in Britain during the last decades. It has got Thomas and Friends themed bedrooms – but mercifully only eleven, and these are on a separate side of the hotel. The bedrooms are well equipped with the usual lcd flatscreen television, laptop safe, hairdryer, iron and ironing board and the obligatory complimentary wi-fi.
Parklands Brasserie Restaurant was very busy the day we visited. It would not have looked out of place in a city centre hotel.
 Where Drayton Manor Hotel does ‘score’ over the competition is with its conference and meeting facilities. Not many hotels have access to a 4D Cinema (located in the theme park). This is a 152 seat classic art deco style cinema from the outside. Inside the latest technology has been used to create special effects lighting and sound. The cinema has a 32ft screen and ‘stimulation’ seating i.e. chairs that move up and down, vibrate, release sprays of water – I am sure you have the picture.
The two main banqueting suites – the Tower Suite (500 guests for a banquet) and the smaller Hamilton Suite are located across from the hotel but not in the theme park itself so guests do need to leave the hotel to access them.
The Park View Suite is located within Drayton Manor Hotel with floor to ceiling windows and a feeling of spaciousness. The Park View Suite will seat up to 200 delegates theatre style, and 120 for a dinner with dance floor. The room splits into two independent sections.
Were we impressed? Yes we were. Location-wise it is only 5 minutes from the motorway complex. Birmingham International Station is about five miles away and so is Birmingham International Airport, not to mention the NEC.
I will now have to start looking for a new ‘dream site’ but at least we have another good option for meetings and banquets in the midlands.
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Site Visit: Radisson Blu Hotel East Midlands Airport - Caroline
 I don’t know what I was expecting but my first impressions of the Radisson Blu Hotel East Midlands Airport were of an: ‘open, spacious, trendy and contemporary hotel – a good place to be’. I have an image in the back of my mind, which I must try and dispel, that airport hotels are dull and functional bed-factories. Nothing could be further from the truth in the case of the Radisson Blu Hotel East Midlands Airport. The colour scheme, for example, is a very stylish minky grey and turquoise throughout.
I took one of our clients to view. She is looking for a venue for two day residential meeting in the area and the Radisson Blu Hotel East Midlands Airport has opened at just the right time.
First the facts:
 Bedrooms:
195 standard bedrooms, 14 business-class guest rooms plus a selection of junior, senior and a presidential suite on the top floor.
All the rooms are really bright and spacious with floor to ceiling windows and some with views across the East Midlands Airport runway. Good news – its complementary wi-fi in all of them and even the standard rooms have slippers which I thought was a nice touch. There is a window from the bathroom into the bedrooms to give any extra touch of roominess but the shower and the toilet are still private!
 Meeting and banqueting space:
The meeting rooms are on the ground floor and grouped together either side of a central corridor. There is a good selection of rooms – nine in total including three excellently equipped boardrooms. The Wheatcroft Suite, the largest, will accommodate up to 250 delegates theatre style. 180 is the maximum number for a banquet. It’s a pity they couldn’t have made it just a little larger - even to match the number of bedrooms. The same comment applies to the main hotel restaurant with just a 100 covers. Still the meeting space is bright and airy and equipped with all the latest AV technology. The fact that rooms are together is useful for the meeting organiser.
 Leisure facilities:
The HÄLSA Health Club at Radisson Blu Hotel East Midlands Airport is also located on the ground floor. It includes a 12.5 metre heated pool as well as a steam room, sauna and fully equipped gym. Again this is bright and open – perhaps a frosted glass wall would have made the swimming pool a touch less public.
Location-wise
the Radisson Blu Hotel East Midlands Airport is 800 metres from the main terminal at East Midlands Airport with a shuttle bus service to and from the hotel. There is plenty of underground parking. East Midlands Parkway Station is a five minute drive away. The M1 motorway is a two minute drive away. If you are looking for a good 4 star modern hotel in a central UK location with easy access then the Radisson Blu Hotel East Midlands Airport has few competitors.
I really liked the hotel and so did my client. I am up there for lunch next week with another client – and they call it work!
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Site Visit: Edgbaston
- Sally
In a couple of years’ time, perhaps earlier, I predict that Edgbaston Cricket Ground will become the focal point of Birmingham’s brand new Conference and Banqueting Quarter. The Quarter will feature the Edgbaston ground itself, which could be renamed ‘Birmingham Edgbaston’ if a local campaign currently being waged is successful. Two hotels are under construction within a two minute walk of the ground totalling around 400 bedrooms. MAC, the newly opened and totally refurbished Midland Arts Centre, also with extensive meeting and training facilities, is just across the road. All ‘components’ are located on the doorstep of Cannon Hill Park, Birmingham’s most popular park covering 250 acres of woodland and sports areas plus a wonderful duck pond. That is all in the future. First I was at Edgbaston Cricket Ground to view the £32million new stand which opened this summer.
 I have seen many sports stadiums and I thought I knew what to expect from Edgbaston – but there were some pleasant surprises in store. Rekha was my guide and we started in the spacious reception area. This is located within the ‘blue-block on stilts’ part of the building which I suspect will become the iconic poster image for the ground. However the new stand extends on both sides of this central entrance to encompass approximately one third of the ground’s perimeter. It’s a lot larger than I thought.
Surprise number 1
was the exhibition space alongside reception with direct access from the car park – block walls, high ceiling, square shaped room, 1050m2, easy to access, easy to use and fully self-contained. The space had recently been used for a ‘wild-west’ themed dinner with very little dressing required.
The main banqueting suite is on the first floor with plenty of lift access. This is a room with floor to ceiling windows at the front and back of the room and with an outdoor balcony overlooking the cricket pitch. The sloping ceiling from front to back adds character to the room as does the dramatic black and white décor. The suite will seat up to 520 guests for a banquet with a dance floor. It should become a very popular banqueting venue.
Smaller meeting rooms, boxes and boardrooms are located on the third floor.
Surprise number 2 is the Jaguar
 Suite – a very well appointed meeting room seating up to 200 delegates theatre style, not surprising considering they are the main ground sponsors.
Surprise number 3 – the suite includes a demonstration kitchen available for corporate hire.
Surprise number 4 is on the fourth floor – it is an open-air barbecue and outdoor dining space overlooking pitch. It is self-contained and ideal for evening receptions in summer. At this level you are very aware of just what a green city Birmingham is. Edgbaston is a mere five minutes by car from the city centre yet the cityscape is framed by trees and green open spaces – definitely
Surprise number 5.
There is parking for 400 cars and there is plenty of grassy space for outdoor activities and team building – and I am not talking about the cricket pitch. There is additional meeting space in the old stand which is very good, bright, spacious and well equipped but sadly they pale in comparison with the facilities in the new stand – still they are available at a discounted rate. Conference and banqueting facilities are operated by Compass.
The next development in Edgbaston will be a new 200-bedroom Doubletree by Hilton hotel. Still a hole in the ground at the moment, it is located opposite the main stand entrance and is expected to open late 2012. IHG are also planning a hotel but details of this await release.
The Birmingham Edgbaston experience is an exciting project which will bring great benefits to the city. It will be fascinating to watch it grow over the next couple of years. I look forward to it.
Thanks to Rekha for her time and hospitality.
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