What: hoteliers around the word are preparing for the new normal

Why it is important: Hotels are, like department stores, designed to be at the heart of cities. They have been also hit very hard by the pandemic. Taking into account new usages and expectations from customers, they are taking steps that are literally a play book for department stores.

The New York Times has asked designers to think the hotel of the future, post Covid, in a world were efficiency and hygiene will be key. Here are the main outcomes of this reflexion:

• Contactless and touchless rom controls, very similar to what retailers are deploying (think about the magic wand app from Showfields)
• Popup dining and robotic servers – automation is also used in retail to expand the opening hours of service, such as in Seoul’s 7-Eleven, staffed during the day and operated by robots during the night
• Bringing the outdoors inside, by using nature (among others). Here, SKP-S and Galeries Lafayette Champs Elysées are already quite advanced in terms of staging,
• Design rooms for a living, which echoes the rise of multi-functional retail: making sure that retailers are meeting the demand where it is.

The future of hotel design