By Kate Krader and Sarah Rappaport, Bloomberg News (TNS)
Michelin is not slowing down on its road to expansion beyond restaurants.
Last autumn, the century-old guide announced that it would bestow keys — the lodging equivalent of dining stars — to hotels around the world. On Tuesday, Michelin released its inaugural guide to the U.K. and Ireland. Fourteen hotels received the highest award — three keys. (The ranking designates “an extraordinary stay.”) Eight of those properties are in London and include the city’s most high-profile lodgings like the year-old Peninsula London in Belgravia, the time-honored Connaught hotel and the Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park.
Other U.K. properties that received three keys include the Newt in Somerset and the country-house styled Lucknam Park in the Cotswolds. In Scotland, the destination hotel and golf estate Gleneagles now has three keys. And in Ireland, two properties got the highest ranking: Adare Manor in Limerick, and Ballyfin Demesne, set in a 19th- century estate.
“Having this award means so much to me, I had tears in my eyes,” says Anna Sas, head of standards at the Newt, speaking to Bloomberg after her property received three keys. She says it reflects the team’s attention to detail and passion.
“The hotels that get the keys are the very best, the ones that stand out,” says Gwendal Poullennec, international director of the Michelin guide. “The rankings are different than what we do for restaurants; there isn’t a checklist on the size of the bed, the air-conditioning. On the hotel list we pay attention to authenticity and value for money.”
Thirty-seven hotels were given two keys (“an exceptional stay”). They includes the Fife Arms in Braemar, Scotland and London’s just-opened Mandarin Oriental Mayfair.
Seventy-two properties received one key (“a very special stay”). Among them are the stylish Charlotte Street hotel and the popular Chiltern Firehouse both in London, the Balmoral in Scotland and St. Mawes in the holiday destination area of Cornwall. Three Welsh properties were given one key, including the Grove Narbeth, a property dotted with cottages.
Although the three-key section of the list leans heavily toward London properties, overall the hotels Michelin awarded are dotted throughout the U.K. and Ireland, from honey-stoned estates in the Cotswolds to grand lodges on Scotland’s Isle of Skye.
The reviews are based on visits from anonymous inspectors who award keys based on criteria that include personality and character, interior design and architecture, service, value for money and their contribution to the overall neighborhood or area.
Poullennec stresses the importance of a sense of place for inspectors, rather than luxury accoutrements. In Spain, the Terra Dominicata Hotel & Winery has three keys and prices starting at 220 euros ($244) a night. In the U.S., Blackberry Farm in Tennessee has two keys, and the price of a stay is “on request.” “We like places that are the unusual suspects,” he says. “The focus is on providing an experience. We want to be an antidote to boring travel.” He adds, “what’s interesting is to go for the one key (places); that’s where the discovery is.”
The key awards were announced at an event at Somerset House on Tuesday in a room filled with hoteliers in suits; it’s the latest in a series of key announcements from Michelin. Earlier this year the company announced keys in France, the U.S. and Japan, among other countries. The U.K. and Ireland can boast more three-key hotels than the U.S., which has 11, and Japan, six, but short of the 24 in France.
Last week, the guide announced its awards in Southeast Asia, in Thailand, where eight hotels received three keys, including the swanky Samujana Villas in Surat Thani in southern Thailand, which is expected to make an appearance in season three of “The White Lotus.”
Poullennec notes that the Michelin hotel list is dynamic and goes beyond ranking just 50 spots around the world. Most of the hotels on a Michelin list are bookable on the site (Michelin gets about a 10% commission on those reservations, says Poullennec), and the nightly room rate is prominently featured.
U.K. hotels did not fare so well in a recent international ranking from the World’s 50 Best. None made the top 10; the highest ranked was the uber classic Claridge’s at No. 11. The year-old $1.76 billion Raffles London at the OWO was No. 13, and also received the Highest New Entry award. Another London hotel, the Connaught, and Gleneagles in Auchterarder, Scotland, also appeared on the list.
These are the 14 Michelin’s Three-key Winners in the UK and Ireland:
The Connaught; Claridge’s; Bulgari Hotel London; Four Seasons Hotel London at Park Lane; Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park; Raffles London at The OWO; The Savoy, London; The Peninsula London; Le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons, A Belmond Hotel, Oxford; The Newt in Somerset; Lucknam Park, Cotswolds; Gleneagles, Auchterarder, Scotland; Adare Manor, Ireland; Ballyfin Demesne, Ireland.
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