Hyatt Regency London – The Churchill is offering guests the opportunity of a lifetime to combine a stay at the hotel with a taste of culture, without even leaving the confines of its magnificent marble lobby.
The hotel has formed a unique partnership with the Saatchi Gallery, London’s leading contemporary art gallery. The partnership, which launched on February 1, celebrates the dynamic cultural mix of London through installations situated within the public areas of the hotel. The Saatchi Gallery will produce three individually themed exhibitions during 2012, creating a cultural playground where guests can interact and participate in a dialogue with the works.
The partnership between the esteemed hotel and the world-renowned gallery is one of many limited edition events from art and culture to food and shopping experiences taking place throughout London during the next several months. Called Limited Edition London, the events celebrate 2012 as the year in which the capital city hosts the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. Don’t miss out on the action, as each limited edition event is just that — a special opportunity that is available for only a short period of time.
“We thought how fun it would be to provide interactive experiences for guests while they are having tea with a friend or with a business colleague,” says Alvaro Valeriani, Area Director of Sales & Marketing for Hyatt International in the United Kingdom and Ireland. “This way, our guests can get something else out of the experience that is not expected. We also wish to provide our guests with an additional cultural interaction — something fun that really makes them feel like they are in London — something really British. The Saatchi Gallery seemed to be the perfect partner for that. Saatchi is such a forward thinker. We wanted to create something guests will not expect that will link them to this city and give them a nice thing to talk about when they go back home,” he adds.
The first of a series of three exhibitions taking place at the hotel throughout 2012 is entitled One Giant Leap. The exhibition represents not only the huge step taken by the Saatchi Gallery and Hyatt Regency London – The Churchill to create this unique partnership, but also an introduction to the wide range of works drawn from the Saatchi Gallery’s collection which has consistently had a reputation for being ground-breaking and innovative.
Highlights of the exhibition include Martin Honert’s Reisen, a monumental sculpture of two giants, each almost 3-meters high, who appear to have stumbled into the hotel; a series of small paintings featuring children, teenagers and young athletes by the highly acclaimed painter Chantal Joffe; Christina Mackie’s life-size hippopotamus (below); two paintings by Dexter Dalwood in which he imagines what you might find if you were invited into the homes of Liberace and the Queen; and Stella Vine’s homage to Margaret Thatcher, an affectionate painting of the former Prime Minister and her husband Denis.
The relationship between the hotel and the art community is nothing new. According to Valeriani, the art crowd started gravitating to the hotel, when Hyatt Regency London – The Churchill became the Main Hotel Partner to Frieze Art Fair in 2008. The hotel has had relationships with other galleries and art dealers, as well. For example: The Churchill recently featured an exhibition of British pop artist Peter Blake’s work, including his iconic piece that was featured on the cover of the Beatle’s Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album.
“The Saatchi partnership raises the stakes,” says Valeriani. “It will create the ultimate playground that will help make the experience for the guests even more fun, memorable and remarkable. The whole idea is to create an interaction and make your hotel experience a bit more quirky, a bit more fun, more relaxed and interesting. We are hoping our guests will interact with the art. We want to encourage debate and surprise people.”
On February 1, the hotel also introduced a Limited Edition Saatchi Gallery Suite (above), which is designed by Saatchi, enabling guests to stay in and experience contemporary art unlike anywhere else in the world. Guests will sleep among a collection of Saatchi Gallery works, an experience not-to-be missed by art and design aficionados looking for a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Highlights include: Ronin Cho’s interactive knocking door entitled We know this but we just don’t know how to show it, Steve Bishop’s Jean-Paul Gaultier – Classique (Arctic Fox), a sculpture combining a taxidermied fox, concrete and paint inspired by the Gaultier perfume bottle; and the recently acquired Rafal Zawistowki’s Judas.
Finally, the young artist Celine Fitoussi will take the suite’s luxury bathroom to a new level, with a bespoke wall-to-wall soap installation (below). Fitoussi’s transformation of spaces into arenas of sensory and visual delight has already caught the attention of top interior designers such as Nicky Haslam.
Furthermore, the Limited Edition Saatchi Gallery Suite is lit by a collection of iconic lamps from the Republic of Fritz Hansen™ KAISER Idell™ collection, designed by Christian Dell. The suite is also furnished with a selection of Fritz Hansen’s much-celebrated furniture designs. These timeless classic designs add depth, warmth and a subtle statement to the Suite.
“In creating the Saatchi Suite, we decided to take the concept to the guest room to see how it would work,” says Valeriani. “Like the film Night at the Museum, imagine if you could do that with a gallery? Imagine if you could combine that and create a place where you can sleep? We wanted to create something that would allow our guests to have a nice sleep while at the same time be inspired.”
Well-situated on Portman Square, Hyatt Regency London – The Churchill is located in the Mayfair neighborhood of London. The hotel recently refurbished its 7th, 8th and 9th floors. Its “hotel within a hotel” concept, called the Regency Club, offers its own concierge, express check-in and check-out service, complimentary breakfast, snacks and cocktails as well as a private board room.
The Limited Edition Saatchi Gallery Suite is available from £700 plus VAT per night from February 1 to 30 April 2012, subject to availability. Guests can make a reservation by contacting the hotel directly at +44 20 7486 5800, or by emailing london.churchill@hyatt.com, or visiting London.Churchill.Hyatt.com.
Fly to London via British Airways. Book seats in its New World Traveller Plus section, the premium economy cabin which offers more space and privacy at a more affordable price than British Airway’s First and Club classes of service. British Airways flies into Heathrow Airport’s state-of-the-art Terminal 5, which opened in 2008.
