hoteldesigns: hoteldesigns

For the second time in a week I found myself in London's Park Lane to celebrate awards, this time the World Travel Awards. I was actually at a kind of 'semi-final' leg of the World Travel Awards, as there are so many categories that there are 'elimination bouts' to produce a number of regional finalists from which the global winner would be selected. On this occasion I was a guest of the AYANA Resort and Spa, Bali.

Whilst my previous visit to Park lane was for the European Design Awards, this was held in the Great Room of the Grosvenor House, London's favourite venue. The converted ice skating rink that makes the Great Room has a superb lighting control system along with televisual and great sound systems. My host Charles de Foucault, the GM of AYANA Resort, led me to the balcony overlooking the room to see what it was like, and was impressed. Despite his own facilities (his hotel can cater for up to 5,000 I am told) he was impressed by the room. Having been here a number of times before (I came to various charity and fund raising events in the 1980's and have come at irregular intervals since) I was impressed by the elegance of Marriott's layout and the clever implementation of the lighting. Lighting used the low voltage spotlight to pick out the flower arrangements, their green offsetting the predominant pink of the rest of the room lighting to dramatic effect.

I was also impressed by the many beautiful women in attendance. "What is it," I thought to myself, "that makes hoteliers so much more attractive than the designers I saw at last week's Design Awards?" Perhaps, I mused, hotel GM's are paid much higher wages than designers (which they are of course)? Perhaps it is because they are accustomed to putting on this kind of event themselves so are more careful of their appearance (designers can be careless of how they dress - even defiantly so)? On closer examination whilst some of the men, like my host, were very dapper it was the number of elegant and beautiful women that was most striking (including my own partner of course).

Only when it was announced that we would be sharing our table with Miss Indonesia did the penny drop - we were in the company of the many young ladies representing their countries competing in December for the Miss World title. AYANA Resort is in Bali which is of course a part of the Indonesian island chain. To the delight of Harry (Haryadi Satriono, the hotel Director of Sales and Marketing) the charming Miss Indonesia, Kerenina Sunny Halim, sat next to him.

Our host, at the opposite side of the table shrugged off his disappointment when he saw Miss Vietnam on stage. "Now is the time to win something," he joked - but indeed he did win then, bounding on stage to receive the award as Asia's Leading Luxury Resort from her hands.

What do I learn from these award ceremonies? Well, the World Travel Award entries are nominated by guests. Then judged by 167,000 people in the industry (travel agents and other industry professionals). By contrast the European Design Awards are entered by the hotel or design practice. Judges are half a dozen designers, hoteliers and writers. Judgement is made on the photographs submitted. As my host said at the World Travel Awards, success for an hotel is the balance between design and operation, and it is difficult to tell this from photographs. Most of the WTA voters had visited the establishment they voted for. Designers too are looking for something different and for the 'shock of the new', so the criteria are different.

Which do I prefer? Well, the food was better at the Marriott, the compére better at the Design Awards (Mariella Frostrup, brilliant), but the WTA had the Miss World contestants - hmmm difficult....