Canberra’s newly launched 4.5 star property, the Burbury Hotel, has eclipsed the hospitality industry’s “home-away-from-home” experience by delivering a new level of in-room ambience, inventive open-plan living and pioneering a new Apple® entertainment system.
Sydney-based architecture and interior design firm, Katon Redgen Mathieson (KRM), has created a luxe presentation that uniquely captures the best of “home”.
“We required interior design that offered global sophistication in our public areas and a timeless, generously comfortable in-room experience,” says Emil Kovacik, General Manager of the Burbury Hotel.
Conceived for the corporate market, the hotel rooms feature dark fabric wall panels, crisp white plantation shutters, and a custom designed carpet. A timber veneer clad box separates the bedroom from the open plan bathroom area and accommodates a built in desk, wardrobes and a mini bar. The vanity is designed as a freestanding furniture element, whilst the shower and toilet are screened by a wall of translucent glass.
Rooms are open-plan, yet each ‘space’ is effectively separated, conjuring a sense of flow and liberating Burbury guests from hotel-room `confinement’, while supplying plentiful room for their accoutrements.
“We felt the bathrooms were an opportunity to offer superior functionality through design, while pampering guests with quality amenities,” says Kovacik.
Each room’s Gohera Limestone entrance flows into a door-less bathroom where clean lines, smooth textures, reflective surfaces and tranquil tones create a clear, uplifting space.
Translucent ice-green glass ‘walls’ separate the limestone-clad wet and WC areas from the vanity space, which is wardrobe-lined on its other side and doubles as an elegantly appointed dressing room.
The Burbury’s rooms are a refined mix of light and shade, moving from crisp, infinite whites, through the serene, sandbar-and-shell tones of the bathrooms to the moodier coffee and chocolate tones of the soft furnishings and carpets.
It is also the first hotel in Australia to pioneer Square-i Apple IPTV, a Mac-Mini®-based in-room solution developed by Square-i International, a new global hospitality solutions company.
Square-i Apple IPTV exceeds the entertainment comforts of home with full Mac computer functionality, iPod, iPad and iPhone-docking, high definition TV, Foxtel®, play-your-own CDs/DVDs, pay-per-view movies, as well as a digital concierge, guest directories and local attractions guide, contained in the super sleek, 3.6cm-thin, aluminium Mac-Mini® “unibody”.
“While the Burbury Hotel echoes the prestige of the Realm precinct’s modern aesthetic, we wanted a cosy, indulgent retreat for travelling and business guests beyond the hectic pace of sight-seeing and professional life. At the end of the day, everyone wants to go home and simply relax,” says Kovicak.
The hotel public areas incorporate dark timber wall panelling and Gohera limestone floors. The hotel corridors continue the colour palette of the guest rooms with a graphic black and tan striped carpet. The Burbury Terrace on the upper level of the hotel is designed as a multi purpose venue for functions, the hotel breakfast service and as a lounge for hotel guests.
Burbury Hotel maintains the same high standards of its parent hotel, Hotel Realm and will take the total number of rooms in the Realm Precinct to 264. It is the next stage in the exciting development that is the Realm Precinct.