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 London Home from Home Hotels
So you're coming to town for a day or two and you just want a roof over your head, somewhere that's sensible, cosy, welcoming and well located... a hotel that feels a bit like home perhaps...a warm fire on a cold day, a comfortable armchair, unfussy food, friendly service, well-equipped but undemanding bedrooms. Hotels that are bursting with character and atmosphere, or cutting edge havens for style victims are for another day... here are our favourite boltholes where, though London's attractions come first and the hotel second, you may find yourself returning time and again. The hotels are listed by price category, and their order bears no reflection on our preference.
 Reviews by Fiona Duncan |
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| Luxury: Cosy yet sophisticated bolthole next to Harrods |
| Location: Knightsbridge, between Harrods and Sloane Street |
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| The baby sister of the Capital (see London/Chic hotels) has emerged from a total makeover with a new name and a gorgeous, intimate interior. A pistachio green Art Nouveau-style lobby leads to smallish but lovely bedrooms with minibars equipped with all you need to make champagne cocktails (nice touch), while the excellent basement bistro, Le Metro has taken on the inviting looks of a contemporary Viennese tearoom. |
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| Mid Price: Delightful Feng Shui friendly bolthole between Chelsea and Fulham |
| Location: South Kensington, between Fulham Road and Kings Road, Chelsea |
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| If an instant sense of softness and wellbeing descends here, then you can thank the Feng Shui consultant who helped design the interior, plus the strategically placed crystals, specially mixed aromas and the even number of fish in the tank. A gorgeous purple bar adjoins a Hamptons-esque sitting/dining room that is one of the most easy going and best conceived in town, while the dusky pink bedrooms ooze calm. |
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| Mid Price: Quintessentially British home-from-home moments from Sloane Square |
| Location: Chelsea, just off Sloane Square |
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| A members’ only home-from-home that delivers comfort and courtesy in traditional British style, with a clubby bar, a restaurant designed by Linley that sparkles under its glass roof, sensible, well-equipped bedrooms and hilarious cartoons on the walls depicting the British upper crust at its eccentric best. Stay more than half a dozen times a year (there’s an annual membership fee) and it’s good value too. Annual membership from £280; doubles from £149 |
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| Mid Price: Smart yet comfortable and welcoming hotel in Little Venice |
| Location: Little Venice; a minute's walk from Warwick Avenue tube |
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| Set in Little Venice, with its canals and bridges, the Colonnade manages to overcome the trappings of a large hotel to provide a private and very welcoming place to stay. Guests are, more often than not, greeted by Minnie the hotel cat, who will sit purring in their arms while the receptionist checks them in. There's a homely sitting room with coal fire, while rooms and suites are smartly done out, many with four posters. Alan Turing, who solved the Enigma Code, was born here, and Sigmund Freud stayed here. |
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