Upcoming London hotels: Properties to watch

1 Feb, 2012 By: Jena Tesse Fox

It looks like London is getting one last big push in hotel openings before the Olympics kick off in July. The Guardian has a great list of upcoming properties worth keeping an eye on:

Belgraves, A Thompson Hotel, opened its doors in the city's Belgravia neighborhood today, according to Luxury Travel Advisor. A joint venture with The Harilela Group, the hotel is the first UK opening from Thompson Hotels. The property has 85 rooms and suites as well as some decidedly cool and funky dining and drinking options.

Just off Fleet Street, the 184-room Temple Court Hotel will open in Serjeants' Inn in the Inner Temple on March 1, the third London outpost of Edinburgh-based family-owned Apex Hotels.

The Bulgari Hotel will open in April on Knightsbridge courtesy of Italian architect Antonio Citterio, best known for his furniture and lamps. It will reportedly have solid silver chandeliers in the ballroom as well as a large spa, screening room, library, cigar shop and smart Italian restaurant and bar.

The city will get its first Norman Foster-designed hotel on June 4, when the 175-room Me by Meliá opens on the Strand. This redevelopment of what was once the Marconi House incorporates its 1904 facade in an otherwise contemporary building with a 11-story round tower-like atrium.

The South Place Hotel will open this summer near Liverpool Street, a seven-story 80-room new-build boutique with Conran interiors and the first venture into hotel-keeping by the D&D restaurant group, which owns the Blueprint Café, Kensington Place, Le Pont de La Tour, Quaglino's, Skylon and others.

Across town in South Kensington, the independent 110-room Ampersand Hotel, due to open just before the Olympics, echoes the 19th century both in its structure (it was built in 1888) and in its eccentric decor, which are reportedly inspired by the area's Victorian museums.

Z Hotels will open a second property on Lower Belgrave Street, near Victoria station, in spring. The rooms will be compact and short on frills, but contemporary, chic and, with rates from £85, very cheap for London.

And finally, Luxury Travel Advisor is reporting that The Leicester Square Odeon, one of London's most popular cinemas, will be reinvented as a hotel. Radission Edwardian has bought the movie house from Irish debt company National Asset Management Agency, for an undisclosed sum. No word yet on an opening date, but the property is expected to have 245 rooms, 33 apartments and five restaurants.