Would your sleep be sweeter if you bedded down in this one-of-a-kind art room guarded by a Yakuza-style mural of Avanyu, the Tewa tribe’s deity of water? Or is original pop art by Warhol more to your taste? Or maybe, Victorian run amuk. Whether you’re an art connoisseur or not, these over-the-top art rooms will add color and excitement to your dreams.
Creation at Dawn at Nativo Lodge
Another of the art rooms in Albuquerque’s Nativo Lodge, Creation at Dawn, illustrates a Navajo creation story, as imagined by a young female artist of Dine Navajo and Chicana lineage. Although the Keeva room, pictured in the previous slide, gets more initial interest, the Nativo staff report that this room draws people back due to its soothing and spiritually reassuring atmosphere.
Asleep in the Cyclone at 21C
One of the trendsetting art hotel brands in the United States, 21C always has made art into an integral part of the guest experience, taking it beyond the public areas and into every available space. This featured “site-specific sculptural installation” in the original Louisville location dominates an entire room, and is the closest human beings will ever come to sleeping inside a kaleidoscope.
Hotel Dorsia
La Belle Époque had its heyday in the late 19th century, and you don’t see too many examples of this sensual, exotic design style in modern times. However, independently owned Hotel Dorsia in Sweden’s “second city” Gothenburg revives Belle Époque with gleeful flair and modern conveniences. Pictured is a premium suite, complete with silk trappings, original oil paintings and fresh flowers. No two guest accommodations in the hotel are alike.
Schoolman Suite at Land’s End Inn
All the way at the outer tip of Cape Cod, the quirky Land's End Inn is a place where layer upon layer of décor has been allowed to accumulate over the years, turning the common areas and the suites into an artistic, visually over-stimulating hodgepodge. Take for example the modestly named Schoolman Suite, which features stained glass lamps, quasi-Victorian art, a shabby chic wrought iron stair rail, and a fully modern whirlpool Jacuzzi in the bathroom.
Boulevard Suite at Planet Hollywood
The insouciant swagger of Eighties rock star culture might have almost disappeared from the Sunset Strip, but Planet Hollywood in Las Vegas pays homage to those glory days in its Boulevard Suites. The walls are hung with rock ‘n roll memorabilia; the black leather sofa and shiny red director’s chairs are Hollywood Hills as a young Bret Easton Ellis might have styled it; and hello, purple ping-pong table! Only Vegas could get the Hollywood cliché so awesomely right.
ABSOLUT Find Your Flavor Suite at Caesars Resort
More critically regarded artworks can be found all over Nobu or in various other Caesar’s VIP suites, but for color-splashed pop art pizzazz, the four so-called “Find Your Flavor” suites in Caesars Palace pack a nice punch. This collection of art rooms was a collaboration between Caesars, Esquire and the vodka brand ABSOLUT. Unveiled in 2007, it’s rather ancient by Vegas standards, but cheerfully flashy experimental elements like the “built-in pool” carpet still catch the eye.
The Digs at Roxbury Motel
Nearly every room in The Roxbury Motel, a pop-surrealist Catskills getaway, has some sort of art theme; but The Digs surpasses all in size, scope and audacity. Named and themed after an Indiana Jones-style archaeological fantasy, The Digs features a 500-pound mahogany and gold-leaf bed, a handmade Egyptian chandelier, and Alexander the Great’s war mask. And that’s just in the pictured room. Not shown: the 400-pound aquarium wherein a Cleopatra sarcophagus has been sunk.
Extreme WOW Suite at W New York – Times Square
Always a hotel brand aligned with art, design, fashion and forward thinking, W Hotels kicked things up a notch with the debut of its latest Extreme WOW Suite at W New York. Of the many rich visual elements in the $2 million suite, the focal point for art connoisseurs is the Times Square-inspired mural “Peep Show” by artist Keren Richter.
Penthouse Suite at Rome Cavalieri
The ultra-luxurious Rome Cavalieri hotel has museum-caliber works throughout, including in its penthouse suite. As in, original Andy Warhol. While the 4-piece Warhol series has pride of place, the rest of the suite is pretty spectacular, from the pinpoint-glimmering painted ceiling to the Karl Lagerfeld limited-edition furnishings.
Heartbeat – Home is Where the Heart Is at Arte Luise
“Fifty artists, fifty rooms, fifty artworks” reads the tag line of the innovative Arte Luise Berlin hotel, which started off as a collaborative artists’ project in the mid-Nineties. Every room, from the bare-bones single/shared bath to the courtyard-facing doubles, is its own original art installation, and the appropriate artist receives royalty fees for every overnight stay. Pictured here is “Heartbeat – Home is Where the Heart Is,” by Berlin street artist Kiddy Citny.
