5 interior design essentials that make for a great hotel room

As an interior designer, and frequenter of hotels, I find that when it comes down to it, the success of a great hotel room interior is all about guest comfort and convenience. So without further ado, I'm jumping straight into today's blog post on (my) 5 interior design essentials that make for a great hotel room.

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I'm going to ignore the obvious essentials of a good hotel room interior design such as a usable layout, comfy bed, and non-design essentials like it being a clean hotel room with free wifi. Oh, and there being tea/coffee/water in the room - these should be absolutely essential if you're staying in a UK based hotel!

01. A variety of different lighting options throughout the hotel room

Great lighting is crucial to the success of any interior design scheme, but it's a design element that often is overlooked, or gotten terribly wrong. When interior lighting is done well, you don't notice it, but when done badly it's all you can notice in a space!

For me, as a hotel guest and as an interior designer, a great hotel room interior needs different lighting types i.e. task lighting, ambient lighting, decorative lighting, as well as having enough lighting sources or choice to suit each hotel guest's personal preference in their hotel room.

If I'm winding down before bed in my hotel room, I want to be able to create a cosy, low-lit interior. So I either need enough lighting sources in the hotel room that I can just have a few on, like the bedside lights, or if there's only one main lighting source in the ceiling this should be on a dimmer system so I can then choose the level of brightness for my hotel room interior.

With plenty of lighting sources and different fittings in a hotel room such as ceiling lights, wall lights and beside table lamps, I find it also an essential to ensure hotel guests can conveniently turn them on and off. There's nothing worse than getting into your comfy hotel bed and turning off the bedside lights, only to the discover the main lighting is still on and can only be switched off near the hotel room door!

02. Having plenty of power sockets where you need them in the hotel room interior

Segueing on from well placed light switches, another interior design essential that makes for a great hotel room is well placed power sockets - and having plenty of them as well.

I can tell an outdated hotel room (or one that hasn't been renovated in a long time) when there's a lack of power sockets next to or nearby the bedside table for things like charging your and laptop etc from the comfort of being in bed. Or getting ready in the morning (or evening) by the main mirror, or on the desk table, and finding no power sockets nearby to plug in your hair straighteners/curler within reachable distance.

An example of not enough power sockets in a hotel room is when you have to unplug table lamps or floor lamps so you can use iron your clothes, or dry or straighten your hair etc. Hotel guests shouldn't be having lots of small inconveniences during their stay if it's something that is easily avoidable like making sure there's enough, well placed power sockets in a hotel room.

If you're a hotel or B&B owner it's so important to imagine and consider what your hotel guests' daily routine will most likely involve, and translating this into the interior design so you can make sure their hotel room stay is as comfortable and convenient for them as possible.. Even something as mundane (but now important!) as easily charging your .

03. Successful acoustic insulation for a peaceful hotel room stay

I think we've all ben there, where it's a fine line between having annoyingly guests with the TV turned up super loud in the adjacent hotel room, and being able to hear them cough or sneeze because the walls are paper-thin.

Poor acoustics due to thin walls is a likely problem in old buildings and you try to overlook it as a hotel guest, but I've also stayed in newly built hotels and could hear the conversation between two people in the next hotel room! In that situation I'd take an educated guess that the walls were built as thin as possible to gain as much as they could with hotel room floor areas, or it was a (bad) cost-saving decision to not use the right or enough acoustic insulating material in the walls.

If you're a hotel owner who gets negative feedback because of external noises, like cars or being situated on a lively public street, the solution will likely be more of an investment with new windows and adding acoustic panelling to walls etc. But if you're looking to generally reduce the noise of guests' day to day activities in your hotel rooms, my interior design essential Number 5 below will give you some ideas of how to do this!

04. Well considered storage furniture & accessories in the hotel room

Unless you're staying in a suite or large hotel room, it quickly becomes all too apparent that the floor space is limited when you can't lay your suitcase out flat on the floor, or there aren't even bedside tables (not even a ledge!) for you to happily place your morning coffee next to you.

Quick side note: no bedside tables was something I experienced first-hand in a London based hotel, and I wrote up a blog post reviewing the interior design of a Locke Hotel. I never thought a bedside table (or just a ledge) would be such a crucial thing for me in a hotel room interior, and was actually what sparked the idea for this blog post.

But back to considered storage furniture and accessories in a great hotel room...

I think what turns a good hotel room experience into a great one is when all the smaller interior design details have clearly taken into account the guest's comfort and convenience.

Simple things like having plenty of hooks or a rail in the ensuite bathroom to place clothes and let wet towels dry; a shelf/ledge above the basin to hold toiletries and makeup if there's not space for a full vanity unit; another ledge in the shower to hold even more toiletries! These are pretty obvious things that you take for granted in your daily routine, but become glaringly lacking in a hotel room interior that hasn't been well designed.

When staying in a small hotel room, I always appreciate clever furniture design such as having a bed frame that you can store your suitcase or large overnight bag underneath, or an open wardrobe/coat rack that has a built-in mini fridge and safe below to keep everything neat and tidy. Creative, bespoke joinery is an invaluable way for hotel owners to get the most out of small hotel rooms, or rooms with awkward layouts.

If you want to learn more, please visit our website GREATON LIGHTING.

05. Beautiful (and functional) soft furnishings and upholstery throughout the hotel room interior

Soft furnishings might sound frivolous, but as an interior designer I'm here to tell you that they are the metaphorical icing on the cake of a great hotel room interior. Similar to icing on a cake (yes, I will keep going with this analogy), soft furnishings are a great way to add visual interest with colour, pattern and texture, avoiding a hotel room interior from looking lifeless. They're also a great way to bring in branding colours and create a specific interior vibe for your hotel guests to experience and enjoy.

One of my favourite hotel brands is The Hoxton - I think they uses soft furnishings and fabrics as a whole so well in their hotel rooms to add plenty of character. All of their hotel room interiors will have curtains, an upholstered headboard, decorative cushions on the bed, and often a rug under the bed. Larger rooms also typically have upholstered tub chairs and even an upholstered bench seat at the end of the bed. If you took away these soft furnishings and upholstery elements it would be a stark hotel room interior, lacking in personality.

Soft furnishings and upholstery are not only a great way to inject colour, pattern and texture into an interior design scheme, they can also help improve the acoustics in a hotel room by dampening sound levels and absorbing noise. Thick curtains can help with external noises getting through the window at night; upholstered headboards and/or wall panels can help reduce noise travelling through hotel room walls; and rugs or better yet carpet can help reduce noise travelling between floor levels.

A lot of the interior design elements I've mentioned today as essential for great hotel room fall under the first and second fix stages of building/creating a space - which an interior designer can do for you!

If you're looking to start your own hotel interior design project, head over to my hospitality interior design service page for more information. Or please do get in touch if you want to chat more about how hiring an interior designer would benefit your independent business.

(Cover image: Igor Myznik via Unspash)

This blog post was written by Sabrine Keir, Surrey based interior designer and founder of Studio SK. Sabrine loves sharing interior design inspiration and advice for small business owners, as well as showing some love to local independent businesses on the blog. Studio SK works on interior design projects in Surrey, the South East and beyond

Hotel bedroom lighting is as important, if not more important, than the lighting in the rest of the hotel. It is partially responsible for the comfort of a guest in a hotel room, which can contribute to their desire to ever stay at your hotel again. In particular, hotel bedside wall lights are important for the comfort of guests. Below, we will explore hotel style bedside lamps and what they can contribute to your suites.

Hotel bedside wall lights are an integral part of any hotel room. Hotel bedside lamps, especially hotel bedside lamps with USB port functionality, can instantly enhance the comfort of your guests.

A hotel bed lamp on either side of a bed can allow one traveller to stay awake while the other sleeps undisturbed. Hotel bedside reading lights also allow guests to enjoy the low light of a lamp at night without having to get up and down to turn off the brighter main light.

For guests who want to unwind at night, having a wall-mounted reading light or even some hotel bedside table lamps to read and relax can play a crucial role in their enjoyment of the space.

There are two main categories: hotel bedside wall lights and headboard reading light fixtures. As youd expect, headboard reading lights are attached to the headboard itself, while hotel style bedside wall lights are affixed to the wall. Sometimes, the latter comes as a recessed headboard reading light that adds modern flair to the space and stays out of the way.

These lights also come either fixed into position or in a flexible arm reading light style that gives greater control over the direction of the light.

Like most other lights, hotel nightstand lights come with general rules of thumb regarding their placement. When placing hotel bedside reading lights, it is a good idea to start 30 to 36 inches above the mattress.

Another way to view this is to place them about six to 12 inches above the average persons shoulder height when sitting up in bed. Be sure that you place it no further than one foot from the edge of the bed to ensure enough light shines down.

Recessed headboard reading lights are one of the most popular types of headboard reading light fixtures. They offer a sleek, modern look as they sit flush with the headboard itself and wont jut out. Not only is this good for preventing guests from bumping their heads on the lights, but it also updates the space and gives it a more contemporary look and feel. Oftentimes, headboards will even be custom made to accommodate this kind of light.

Hotel bedside wall lights with LED bulbs bring their own suite of benefits as opposed to traditional bulbs in the fixtures:

• ENERGY EFFICIENT. As people use the establishment 24 hours a day, operating lights constantly in one room or the other can really add up. Since LED lights use most of their energy as light as opposed to traditional bulbs that output most of it as heat, they are more energy efficient. This is not only better for your budget but also better for the environment.

• LONG LASTING. Since LED lights are known to operate for a minimum of 20,000 hours before needing to be replaced, you wont need to be constantly replacing the bulbs when they burn out after only short periods of use.

• COOL TO THE TOUCH. The negligible heat output of LED lights means guests wont feel overheated sitting beneath such hotel style bedside reading lights. Beyond that, the air conditioning units wont need to run harder to accommodate them. It also means that they stay cool to the touch, so theres no risk of burning ones hand.

• VERSATILE AND DIVERSE. With the ability to choose colour temperature, lumens and other features, LED lights give you more customizable control over their look and functionality.
  

• CUTTING EDGE TECHNOLOGY. LEDs are a modern light style that can connect to smart systems, be dimmed and have other contemporary functions that make them easier to control and easier to maintain.

Lumens are a unit of measurement that indicates how bright or dim a light will be. Bedside reading light fixtures should be bright enough to easily see to read without strain while still being dim enough to be gentle on the eyes.

Therefore, the recommended lumen count of the hotel bedside wall lights you intend to use for reading should each be around 400 to 450 lumens.

Colour temperature is a way to qualify a lights warmth or coolness. It is indicated with a score marked in Kelvin units. The higher the Kelvin rating, the cooler the light will be; the lower the rating, the warmer that light will be.

Cool and warm lights both have their places, but warm lights are generally preferred in domestic and hotel settings. For a guest room, the recommended colour temperature falls between k and k. This is a neutral but warm light that provides ample illumination without being aggressively bright and cool.

Table lamps are another common light source in a hotel room. They are an effective method of adding task lighting while contributing to the overall style. They can be placed on the bedside tables within easy reach of those in the bed.

A practical light that is simple to operate and stylish can bring form and function together in your hotel suite and make it more memorable. These are generally a good choice for smaller hotel rooms or rooms that dont have a lot of vertical space for wall mounted lights.

Generally speaking, youll only need one bedside table lamp per table, meaning one on each side of the bed at most. Choose a lamp that measures roughly one-third of the nightstands width to give it a balanced look. In terms of height, choose a lamp that is only two or three inches taller than the total height of the nightstand. So, for instance, a 25-inch tall nightstand should get a table lamp no taller than 28 inches.

Finally, you will want to make sure that the lamp you have chosen matches the decor, style and colour scheme of the rest of the room so that it doesnt stick out.

For ultra-modern hotel rooms, the Elegante Square Recessed LED Bedside Reading Light is a great choice. It features a sleek and contemporary square shape and a moveable head that prioritizes minimalism. To turn the light on, just press the light to turn the head outward. Then, you can push it back into place and send it flush against the wall again. It comes in your choice of black, silver or white finishes and shines 206 lumens of k warm white light.

The LWA322 3 Watt Recessed LED Reading Wall Light is a recessed bedside wall light that has a tube-shaped head. The head flips in and out of the rectangular backplate, so it stays out of the way when not in use. Each light shines 120 lumens of k warm white light, perfect for a reading light. It comes in your choice of a black or polished chrome finish.

The Antico 3 Watt Switched LED Wall Mounted Reading Light is characterized by its long, thin body and flexible light arm. The light can be turned and twisted in any direction to shine light exactly where you want it. It is controlled by a simple on/off switch. This gold-toned light plays host to a three-watt bulb that outputs 250 lumens of k warm white light.

Thanks to its USB port, the LWA421 4 Watt Bedside LED Reading Wall Light With USB And Wireless Charging offers so much more than light. Alongside the included USB charging port, it also features a wireless charging base that instantly modernizes the hotel room while adding to its convenience. The lamp is available in black or white finishes with matching lamp shades to give it a cohesive appearance. It shines 320 lumens of k warm white light.

Give your hotel suite a refreshing, light and modern update with the LWA315 3 Watt LED Beech Wood Wall Mounted Reading Light. This unique, authentic beech wood light features a circular backplate that plays host to the matching wood arm. The metal light at the end of the arm is finished in your choice of black or polished chrome. A total of 120 lumens of k warm white light is output in a narrower beam than some other lamps to give it a concentrated illumination property.

Contact us to discuss your requirements of hotel bedside lights. Our experienced sales team can help you identify the options that best suit your needs.