Start your holiday early… Marriott London Heathrow Competition!!

Once the bags are packed, boarding passes printed, nothing left to do other than getting to the airport on time… What better way to start a wonderful holiday than having an extremely comfortable, totally relaxing night’s sleep before flying?? 

The magnificent Marriott London Heathrow is pure Heathrow luxury and is offering you all the opportunity to win the following:

**One night stay in a standard double with breakfast and 7 nights parking!**

The Marriott London Heathrow is the perfect start to the perfect holiday. You will be up and raring to go after a great meal in one of their amazing restaurants and a good night’s sleep in one of the famous Marriott beds!

So in order to be in with a chance to win all you have to do is become a friend of the London Hotel experts on facebook and follow this link to complete this simple phrase….

I’d like to start my holiday early at the Marriott London Heathrow because…

Put your answers on the London Hotel Experts Facebook page – here! The best answer will win!!

Entries close at 5pm on Thursday 19th May, the winner will be announced on Friday 20th May…

St Pancras Renaissance Hotel London – A Victorian Master Piece – Restored!

May 5^th, London sees perhaps one of the most exciting hotel openings of all time, the historic Midland Grand Hotel at St Pancras International Station will officially be open from May 5^th as St Pancras Renaissance Hotel London exactly 138 years on from the original opening of the Midland Grand Hotel.

This history of the hotel is truly mind blowing; it started in 1865 when Midland Railway ran a competition to design a 150 bedroom hotel with a brief that it needed to add lustre to its soon to be completed St Pancras station. George Gilbert Scott submitted an entry, perhaps inspired by the designs for the Houses of Parliament in Westminster which was under construction at this time Scott submitted a plan far bigger, grander and far more expensive than the original specification.  Nevertheless, his audacity paid off and he was awarded the contract in 1866.

Construction of the Midland Grand Hotel, as it was originally known, took place between 1868 and 1876 and was completed in various stages with the East Wing opening on 5th May 1873 by Queen Victoria and the rest gradually opening through until the end of 1876.

The architecture of the building is most commonly categorised as Gothic Revival, the predominant architectural style at the time, and it is still considered by many to be the finest example of this type of architecture in Britain today

The status schematics of the hotel were contrary to the hotels of today; the Midland’s grandest rooms were on the lower three floors with the upper floors providing more basic rooms and staff accommodation.  This was exemplified by the finish and size of the rooms: the first floor rooms were 18ft high with Axminster carpets and walnut furniture with gold inlay; by the third floor the carpets were Saxony and the ceilings had a height of only 13ft

For a building of this size and style which required the use of gas lighting, every trick was used in its construction toallow as much natural light in as possible: huge rooms with huge windows; ornate, gothic fanlights above every door; as well as wonderfully arched stairwells.  The most famous of these and widely considered the most majestic in the country is the Grand Staircase.

This extraordinary double staircase is a fantastic example of high-Victorian, gothic decoration.  The ballustrading, in wrought iron, contains original gas fittings and snakes three stories up to a vaulted ceiling, the most obvious suggestion of Scott’s reputation as the most eminent ecclesiastical architect of the age.  During his lifetime he either designed or collaborated on over eight hundred churches and worked on all but two of Britain’s cathedrals.  This vaulted ceiling is painted with stars as well as the Virtues and heraldic arms of the Midland Railway.

The hotel oozed extravagance; the Victorian decor was luxurious and lavish with extensive decoration in gold leaf and open fires in every room.  Ornate stencilling and flamboyant wallpapers governed every inch of the hotel, much of which is being unveiled and restored for the first time in decades.

In the Dining and Coffee Room (now The Gilbert Scott restaurant) pillars of polished limestone lined the walls with their gilded capitals carved with conkers, pea pods and peas and bursting pomegranates.  The Ladies’ Smoking Room (actually the gentlemen’s and ladies’ smoking room but because it was the first room in Europe in which ladies could smoke publicly it became known as this) housed one of the most elaborately decorated ceilings in the hotel as well as granite pillars, carved stonework and two great fireplaces of different coloured marbles.  Each of these features is being beautifully restored.

The Midland Grand’s reputation was quickly cemented and it was widely recognised as one of London’s leading hotels.  The hotel continued to make a huge impression until post WWI but it then became too expensive to both maintain and heat.  Another contributing factor was the severe deficiency in bathrooms; only five bathrooms housing a total of nine baths were available to serve the three hundred bedrooms with an army of servants having to fill in for the rest.

There is no doubt that this has been one of the most significant restoration and redevelopment projects witnessed by an English Heritage listed property in recent decades.  Hundreds of expert craftsmen and painters have been employed on site to undertake this work and at one time or another every leading conservation expert in the South-East has been engaged in the project.  The results are a kaleidoscope of colours, patterns and periods: from the deep, rich reds and golds in The Gilbert Scott bar taken from the room’s 1892 interior scheme, to the brighter but more muted greens and golds of the Ladies’ Smoking Room ceiling, an exact replica of its original 1870s design.  Although every room in the Chambers building has a different story to tell through the exceptional work that has been accomplished within, one can’t forget of course the building’s most famous feature, the Grand Staircase, the extraordinary decoration of which has been fully restored to its 1901 glory including fleur-de-lis patterning and the panels of the 7 Virtues.

The St Pancras Renaissance Hotel London will formally open on 5^th May 2011, exactly 138 years after the Midland Grand Hotel originally opened.  It will be the final piece of the St Pancras regeneration projectt, The St Pancras Renaissance Hotel London will accommodate the majority of areas of historical importance within the building resulting in a 5* wonder exuding contemporary grandeur.