Yotel’s no frills chic

One of the world's first NO FRILLS CHIC hotels, set to open in London soon.

Avid readers of our trendwatching.com newsletter may recognize this one: YOTEL, a NO FRILLS CHIC hotel to be opened in London soon, brought to you by the people behind YO! Sushi and other YO! concepts. YOTEL will be a chain of funky NO-FRILLS CHIC hotels offering small but highly designed rooms (resembling sleeping pods now found in some first class airline cabins), featuring Sony flat screen TVs with surround sound speaker systems, WiFi access, a choice of hundreds of downloadable movies and CDs, double rotating beds, aircraft cabin mood lighting, and rain showers. Check in/out will be automated. However, the most interesting element of YOTEL is its windows, which are internal rather than external – they look into the corridors, which are in turn naturally lit through reflective mechanisms and channeling of light. This allows YOTEL to boldly go where other hotels simply can’t – tricky central city locations, airports, even underground. Reduced property costs and savings can then be passed on to consumers, resulting in a NO-FRILLS CHIC experience at NO-FRILLS CHIC prices: about GBP 70 (USD 135 / EUR 105) per night.

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