Five hot hotels in sizzling Mayfair
Forget hipster Shoreditch, the place to be in London now is good old Mayfair. Home to more than two thirds of the world’s top 100 luxury brands, 23 Michelin-starred restaurants and dozens of galleries, Mayfair also boasts 18 five-star hotels. Here are five of the hottest places to stay.
45 Park Lane, Park Lane
Opened in 2011, 45 Park Lane (above) is The Dorchester’s less formal, hipper sibling. With rooms and suites by New York-based designer Thierry Despont, 45 Park Lane is very keen on capital letters: BAR 45 is its first-floor cocktail lounge, while CUT is its American steak restaurant. But you tend to forgive this rather shouty approach when you realise that not only is CUT overseen by internationally acclaimed chef Wolfgang Puck, but it serves mouthwatering 6oz Japanese Wagyu steaks, albeit at an eyewatering £128 a pop. Its location, a stone’s throw from The Dorchester and opposite Hyde Park, is quintessential London. From around £499 per night.
The Beaumont, Brown Hart Gardens
The Beaumont opened in 2014 and is owned by Chris Corbin and Jeremy King, the restaurateurs behind The Wolseley and The Delaunay, among others. Housed in a 1926 garage, it offers a splendid Art-Deco interior, classic grill room restaurant, American bar, and a spa and gym, as well as 73 rooms and suites, one of which has a modular room designed by sculptor Antony Gormley. It’s in a great spot in a quiet square, just minutes from Selfridges, with a a buzzy, unpretentious atmosphere, though you might need a torch to read the cocktail menu in the dimly lit bar. From around £400 a night.
When the private members club founded by Charles Dickens in 1863 opened 16 rooms and suites last year, executive director Alice Chadwyck-Healey claimed it was aiming at ‘a very international guest’ who wanted to ‘relax in a high-quality, glamorous and discreet suite in central London’. Rooms, with their specially commissioned furniture, Art-Deco bathrooms and antique bronze doors are certainly that, and even though the hotel has no gym or spa, it does offer live musical performances in its basement club and three restaurants. Plus there’s always the chance you will bump into members Grayson Perry, Gwyneth Paltrow and Sir Peter Blake in the bar. From around £600 per night (rooms must be booked by a member; membership costs £2,000 per year, plus a £2,000 joining fee).
No 5 Maddox Street, which opened just over a decade ago, combines what it calls the ‘luxury and services of a hotel’ with the ‘privacy and space of home’ – serviced apartments, in other words, which can be a great option if you don’t have £1m plus to spend on your own Mayfair pied-à-terre. There are 12 one-, two- and three-bedroom suites, each with living area and kitchen. There’s no restaurant – no hardship in Mayfair – though there is 24-hour concierge service and some rooms have a balcony. From around £356 per night.
There isn’t much to choose between the stupendous Claridges and the equally stupendous Connaught, but if you’re after the quintessential W1 experience, I think the latter just wins it. The legendary Connaught Bar is a destination in itself, Hélène Darroze’s two Michelin-starred restaurant is sublime, and this is the only hotel in London with an Aman spa (and we do like an Aman spa). From around £420 per night.
BY MAGGIE O’SULLIVAN
