Like everything involved in hospitality design, public area flooring
is expected to visually communicate and embody a brand while also
creating aesthetic interiors. Add to this considerations such as uniqueness, eco-consciousness,
cost-effectiveness and low hassle, as well as the need to bring in a
hint of local flavour, suddenly the business of public-area flooring
commands a good deal of attention to detail. Compared to in-room flooring, those in public areas need to be sturdier
to withstand higher footfalls and, in some cases, weather conditions. So
the thickness — or grammage, as some manufacturers call it — of the
carpets need to be higher and tiles must be heavy-duty.
Carpets
The carpet in Hilton The Hague, in Holland, was designed by Angelika Kok
of Barzileye Concept & Design. Her brief was to bring local
personality to the hotel, and she combined two design solutions. The
first was inspired by aerial footage from the city and its rural
surroundings: the design team at Desso, a Netherlands-based
international specialist in carpets for the hospitality sector,
translated these images into a carpet design for corridors and meeting
rooms.
For her second component, Kok pixilated a small portion of the Panorama
Mesdag, one of the most iconic paintings from the Netherlands, which was
again translated into Axminster carpet by Desso for the hotel’s Mesdag
Ballroom.
Incorporating a city into a hotel is a relatively newer trend and
carpets are the first canvas for this. Desso’s recent projects for
boutique hotel brand citizenM in Amsterdam and Scotland include working
with images of each city centre for corridor carpets.
The Le Meridien in Chiang Mai, Thailand, used a map of the historic city as the key design inspiration for their carpets. “We understand the importance of branding in the hospitality sector, and
have a long experience of working with hotel operators and design teams
to creatively bring brands to life,” said Roland Jonkhoff, MD of
Desso’s hospitality, marine and aviation division.
Architects and designers share their creative briefs with carpet
manufacturers who then translate these ideas into the carpet. This isn’t
always a cake-walk as public-area floors involve many more complicated
components than beds and couches, as is the case in guest rooms.
Patodia Contract is credited with creating the public-area flooring at
the Aman New Delhi and the ITC Gardenia in Bangalore, among numerous
others, and is currently working on the Shangri-La Mumbai and the JW
Marriott New Delhi Airport. The company developed a black metallic
carpet using Lurex, which is metal yarn made for designers, to render
the metallic look for the Blue Bar at the Taj Palace, New Delhi.
Among their recent projects is hand-woven carpeting for the 15,000 sq-ft
Durbar Hall at the Taj Palace, New Delhi. Director Pranay Patodia says:
“We finished the carpet as a single piece. At our workshop, a special
area of over 15,000 sq-ft was created for the latexing and finishing
it.”
Tiles
It is only a matter of time before customisation also extends to
tile-manufacturers who are keen to create products specifically for
the industry. Sudhir Malesha, CEO of RAK Ceramics, says: “Hotels are opting for tiles
that look like they have been made from natural materials such as marble
or stone. Digital methods allow us to print images on tiles. Anything
that can be captured in a photograph can be printed on the tile.”
A superlative in process is seen at the recently opened Grand Hyatt Goa.
“Our hotel has a palace design, so this flooring was needed to reflect
that. The technology used involved small, handmade marble biscuits. The
marble and concrete mixture had to be polished nine times for the final
finish. It is very labour intensive but our contractor, GA Design from
Mumbai, has done a fantastic job and the finish is perfect,” says Stefan
Radstorm, the property’s general manager.
The sheer number of materials used in various parts of the hotel,
related to each area’s traffic and requirements is impressive. At the
Marriott Pune City Centre, at least five different flooring materials
have been used across public areas. “There is a mix of sandstone and
marble on the porch, lobby and coffee shop areas, wooden flooring at the
restaurants and banquet pre-function areas, unfinished granite at the
swimming pool and some of the porch areas, and sleeper wood at one of
the outside areas near Banyan Tree,” says Heena Srivastava, director of
rooms at Marriott Pune City Centre.
Who’s the boss?
This is perhaps the one area in which a third party’s word tends to
trump that of the hotel owner. Architects tend to call the shots, basing
their selection on several parameters. Srivastava confirms this, saying
that in Marriott’s case, it was the interior designer who would select
materials for public areas that would suit the decor of the area.
Patodia says: “While a manufacturer may meet an owner’s demands, which
are usually quality and maintenance-focused, designers and architects
want to see who can provide maximum customisation, quality translation
of their idea into a carpet and whether they will provide efficient
developmental support.”
Another carpet manufacturer, Venjara Carpets, has found that the
decision rests with architects and the operating brand. The company’s
Manoj Jagwani says: “Most demands and instructions are about adhering to
brand design, colours and trademarks.” Venjara has experienced work on
two Sun-n-Sand properties and several three-star hotels.
Green times
Patodia says that green is increasingly popular. “The big demand is
definitely green certification, which is given by the carpet CRI in the
US. Handmade carpets don’t come into their ambit but are in any case
eco-friendly as they use cotton and wool, which are bio-degradable.”
Handmade is said to be the most popular among Indian hotels in smaller
public areas, such as receptions and lobbies, due to texture and
finishing limitations with machine made carpets. Patodia says: “Hand-made carpets are usually of Thai, Chinese or Indian
origin and of the three, Indian manufactured, hand-made carpets offer
the best price.”
However, machine-made carpets have a different set of benefits. “We
would opt for machine-made. They are economical and long lasting,” says
Srivastava.
Jagwani says other demands are for fire resistant flooring materials that are easily vacuum cleanable.
A downside with handmade carpets is that they take longer to create. “We
can deliver a hand-made carpet ex-mill within a minimum of eight weeks
if it is not too complicated but it can take 16 weeks for very
complicated, intricate designs,” says Patodia. He has even seen some
projects that demand a year’s lead time. Desso’s carpet at the The Renaissance Vinoy Hotel in Florida took 500 hours to design.
Faux natural
There is also the growing trend of giving a supremely natural feeling to
floors and walls that that is becoming increasingly popular among
hotels. This look can achieve the effect of bringing the outdoors in.
The Marriott Pune City Centre has implemented this. “The extensive use
of the wooden surfaces is unusual,” says Srivastava, speaking of what
has been done differently at her property.
In order to better cater to hotel the prime industry needs of time and
scale, tile manufacturers are working on enabling larger-sized tiles
with natural prints.
“Computer prints tend to be on smaller tiles but now we have already
graduated to tiles of 75x75 cm and we’re all in the process of getting
into 1x1 metre so then we’ll be able to serve hotels even better,”
Malesha adds.
Tiles work well for hotels that want to save time as against natural
materials. “When it comes to marble and stone, it may take time to
source perfect matches. Very rare types of marble may need to be
imported again resulting in time lapse. Tiles do away with all these
hassles,” Malesha says.
Laminate wooden flooring, although less exotic looking than its natural
hardwood counterpart, is better for public areas that are alfresco
because natural hardwood tends to expand. Similarly, engineered wood is
manufactured by binding wood particles together with adhesives, and are
easier to assemble as well as maintain.
Brands such as Nitco target hotels looking at tiles for their public
area flooring. Customisation to brand design and colours is an obvious
promise: they are keen to make known that mosaics are possible with
pre-designed formats or brand centric ones.
