hospitalitystyle.com

(December 2008) posted on Mon Nov 03, 2008 EST

Inventive layouts and careful test-fitting bring heritage hotels’ most outmoded spaces up to today’s guests’ expectations.

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By Deborah Lloyd Forrest, ForrestPerkins

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Deborah Lloyd Forrest specializes in putting the grandeur back in grande dames. During her 30-year career, she has preserved, protected and prettified such icons as The Fairmont Empress in Victoria, B.C.; The Fairmont Royal York, Toronto; The Brown Palace, Denver; and The Hermitage Hotel, Nashville.

One of the toughest aspects, says the ForrestPerkins principal, is developing a design with all of the amenities modern luxury travelers demand without losing the context of the historic hotel.

Though splendid public spaces and warrens of guest rooms pose significant hurdles, it's the guest bathrooms in heritage hotels that often stretch designers' creativity to the max. Here Forrest gives expert advice on how to marry the past, present and future to create pampering bath spaces.

 

Guest bathrooms represent some of the biggest challenges in historical renovations or restorations. They vary in size from the nearly palatial to the closet-sized-sometimes in the same hotel. It's up to the designer to find both the concept that will support a maximized rate and the process that will control costs across this spectrum of spaces.

Overall, the most effective way to ensure luxury standards in a historic hotel is to start by gutting the guest floors. That's what we did at The Hermitage, which was closed for 14 months while the guest floors were demolished and replaced with generous new rooms and bathrooms designed to meet the expectations of today's demanding guests.

UPGRADING TO FIVE FIXTURES

Achieving a Mobil Five-Star rating was the primary goal around which every design decision turned. For example, the requirements called for a five-fixture bathroom, so we carefully planned just enough space to accommodate two vanity bowls, a soaking tub, a generous shower and a separate toilet. 

First we laid out several bathroom templates, then test-fitted them into the plan, taking care to center the tub under a window wherever possible. Then, with the bathroom module in place, we could locate the demising walls between guest rooms to achieve the desired 450- square-foot minimum room size. In the end, the focus on adhering to ratings standards paid off: The Hermitage achieved AAA Five Diamond status within nine months of reopening in 2004 and received Mobil Five-Star designation the following year, the only hotel in Tennessee to be so honored.

SHOWERS SAVE SPACE