Friday 3rd September:
Bed but not bored
Wanderlust is the latest funky crashpad to join Singapore’s growing and eclectic family of boutique hotels. The building, situated in the vibrant backpackers enclave of Little India, was originally an old school built in the 1920s and each of the four thematic levels of 29 rooms were designed by award-winning Singapore agencies, each of whom were given full creative freedom.
But with room rates starting at S$180, Wanderlust is no hovel. Instead, it’s more of a great value experience for adventurous business travellers who dare to venture off the beaten track and away from the usual big-name chains.
(Cheers, Dom.)
Via. http://wanderlusthotel.com/concept/
Tagged with: Hotel, Leisure, Travel
Wednesday 18th August:
Going underground
Under Waterloo station, there’s a cavernous network of tunnels. Dark, dank and mysterious, they’re now a venue for underground (in both senses) cultural events. The Old Vic Theatre acquired them earlier in the year and has put the space to fantastic use. The Old Vic Tunnels, as they’re known, have echoed to a screening of Banksy’s film, Exit through the Gift Shop, and experimental gigs and theatre.
Next up is a Dark Carnival on Friday 20 and Saturday 21 August. It’s a ‘festival celebrating the theatrical experience and the possibilities therein. Showing a range of artists who are crossing boundaries and play with the very form of art itself. Whose projects are constructed in the liminal frameworks between aesthetics and utility, object and the operative, architecture and performance. Wondrous art and artists to be found in the village of vignettes, bringing you a night never to forget.’
If you go along, look out for the lavishly graffitied underpass on your way out. It’s quite something.
Ref. http://www.oldvictheatre.com/whatson.php?id=63
Tagged with: Art, Events, Leisure
Monday 2nd August:
It’s a ping! thing
There’s a table tennis craze sweeping London this summer. Thanks to the four-week Ping! festival, there are 100 ping-pong tables popping up around the city as the sport tries to shed its geeky image to become the latest urban trend in time for the 2012 London Olympic Games. (Smashing spot, Elliot.)
And London isn’t the only city to be rediscovering the joys of table tennis. One of the first to embrace trendy ping-pong was the Dr. Pong bar in Berlin, which offers a musical chairs version of the game and gets up to twenty punters involved, often playing with a beer in one hand and a bat in the other.
Damon Albarn and Susan Sarandon are also big fans of the game. Sarandon even co-owns the wildly successful ping-pong club, SPiN, in New York and is planning to open two more clubs in L.A. and Milwaukee. Everyone’s going ping-pong crazy.
Via. http://uk.news.yahoo.com/18/20100723/tuk-londoners-rediscover-trendy-ping-pon-a7ad41d.html
Tagged with: Leisure, Sport
Thursday 3rd September:
Helping people find their own way
Travellers looking for a good map or guide must first navigate through an overwhelming array of impersonal alternatives. But new Swiss start-up, A la Carte Maps, takes a more handcrafted, artistic approach. A guidebook, tourist map and original artwork in one, they give you information the way a local friend might, using hand-drawn maps and friendly language.
Currently available for Barcelona, Munich, Zurich, Shangai, Tokyo and Washington DC, the maps present each city’s best-kept insider tips on a beautiful, 70x42cm, hand-drawn map. The accompanying welcome letter gives key information such as where to exchange money and what to do on a rainy day, while access to a comprehensive city database lets you create a customised itinerary. In addition to these ‘My City à la Carte’ maps, seasoned travellers can also use their own notes and artwork to create a more personalised map.
Both types of map are ad-free and matt-laminated, and cost €8.90. Even better, A la Carte donates 10% of the profits from each map to a social project in the city it represents.
Ref. http://springwise.com/tourism_travel/alacarte/
Tagged with: Leisure, Personalisation, Social networking, Travel
Tuesday 14th July:
How can make sure you design the ‘right’ choice?
America’s Yellowstone Park discovered that signs reading ‘Please don’t litter’ actually caused littering to increase. The words weren’t ‘positive’ enough, so they changed the signs to the more engaging, ‘People who love the environment take their litter home’ – and more people started taking their litter home. (Merci, Le Nic)
Take a look at ‘Nudge’ by Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein for more on this insight. The book shows how people often behave irrationally, and offers some gentle ‘nudging’ techniques for making them behave more responsibly and sensibly.
For example, the bosses at Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport, fed up with urine all over their floors, painted black flies in the centre of the urinals. By giving men something to aim at, accuracy was dramatically improved.
Monday 6th July:
It’s good to give back
To celebrate their 25th anniversary, Virgin Atlantic is giving something back to loyal customers –with vTravelled.com. This ‘travel community’ website is where seasoned travellers can share their experiences across the world. Where better to learn about the best sights, restaurants and hotels? (Many thanks to Jonny for this one.)
If you’d like to know more, visit www.vtravelled.com
Tagged with: Leisure, Social networking, Travel
Monday 22nd June:
Kindness never goes out of fashion
Members of Hyatt’s Gold Passport loyalty program already enjoy numerous benefits when they visit a Hyatt hotel. Soon, however, they’ll also benefit from a new Hyatt initiative – to deliver random acts of kindness.
Hyatt’s mission is to provide ‘authentic hospitality’. CEO, Mark Hoplamazian, defines it as “making a difference to the lives of those we touch.” As part of a new effort to take better care of its Gold Passport members, Hyatt will soon lavish these guests with pleasant surprises designed to delight them during their stay. In a recent blog post, Hoplamazian wrote, “Don’t be surprised if Gold Passport picks up your bar tab, comps your massage or treats your family to breakfast. It’s part of bringing authentic hospitality to life and making you feel more than welcome.”
Not only does the effort stand a good chance of boosting the authenticity of Hyatt’s service delivery, it’s also a shining example of the kind of corporate generosity increasingly being sought by disillusioned consumers, and offered by clued-in brands.
Ref. http://www.springwise.com/tourism_travel/hyattgoldpassport/
Tagged with: Authenticity, Hotels, Leisure
Friday 12th June:
How can you zag in your market?
Think like the James Hotel in Chicago http://www.jameshotels.com/ who were clocked by the trendspotters at PSFK for their strong approach to sustainability – such as providing soap without the middle bit, because no one uses the middle bit at hotels.
In the hotel’s own words: As a globally and socially conscious institution, The James is committed to protecting our environment and conserving its precious resources. In this spirit, our Chicago property now features the following:
- In-room cards that allow guests to choose how often their linens and towels are laundered.
- Recycling in all guest rooms.
- 100% recycled paper for all hotel communications.
- Triple-distilled tap water as a high-quality alternative to bottled water, both in guest rooms and at David Burke’s Primehouse.
- A ‘Green Team’ that meets frequently to brainstorm new ways to make The James Chicago even more environmentally friendly. (Their recent work on the hotel’s recycling program decreased waste pickups by more than 30%.)
- Active membership in the Green Hotels Association in Chicago.
Ref. http://www.psfk.com/2009/06/middleless-eco-soap.html
Tuesday 26th May:
How can you tap into the seasons?
Summer is fast approaching – time to explore the great outdoors, hang out at festivals and go camping. So try thinking like Shit Box who recognise the possibility of getting caught short as we explore nature’s bounty.
Flat-packed, the Shit Box opens out into a rigid but comfy loo into which you can drop your fudge, again and again, without making a mess or gassing everyone within a five-mile radius. That’s because it comes with 10 biodegradable poo bags. Brilliant.
Available in two sizes, the 14” original and a smaller ‘Little Jack’ version for nippers, it’s ideal for festival goers, campers, Portaloo-less builders, fisherman and kids caught short on long journeys. It even comes with a fetching shoulder bag. (Thanks to Jules for this big one.)
Ref. http://www.firebox.com/product/2351/Shit-Box
Monday 20th April:
How can you get end-users to contribute to your brand’s authenticity?
Think like Dutch hospitality group, La Bergère. They’re developing a new hotel in Maastricht, temporarily dubbed Hotel X, and are filling it with furniture and knick-knacks bought from ordinary people.
The underlying concept for Hotel X is ‘style, sex and soup’, which—in a nutshell—stands for ‘design, attraction and authenticity’. To find unique furniture and nostalgic items to help them achieve the desired vibe, Hotel X is asking people to rummage through their attics, spare rooms and garages, and offer their unused objects for sale. People can upload a picture of the item they’d like to sell, along with a short description and an asking price.
While authenticity and nostalgia aren’t exactly new to the hospitality sector, this is still a clever way to find remarkable pieces, and also drum up interest in Hotel X before it opens. Moreover, by encouraging people to look for ‘cash in the attic’, it taps into the current very of-the-moment of helping people make money instead of just spending it.
Ref. http://springwise.com/tourism_travel/stijlsexsoep/