London hotels

22 Jermyn Street

22 Jermyn Street, SW1. Phone: 734 2353. Fax: 734 0750. Price: £170 ($258) without breakfast. All major cards. 184 rooms. (E2).

A small and stylish hotel with gracious service for discrete connaisseurs on the north side of Jermyn Street near Regent Street, a few steps south of Piccadilly.

The discrete entrance masks the civilized interior with Edwardian antiques and fresh flowers. The 24 hour service is efficient and personalized at this hotel in the third generation of private owners. A weather forecast is even availabe at the breakfast table, also same-day washing, internet / fax facilities, and temporary membership of a neighboring health center.

The greenish room no. 104 is cozy and exquisite, with lots of quality furniture and thick rugs and curtains, strange drawings on the walls and a mirror on the desk. The marbled bathroom has all the amenities, including bathrobes.

Aster House

3 Sumner Place, SW7. Phone: 581 5888. Fax: 584 4925. Price: £78 ($118) without breakfast. All major cards. 12 rooms. (B4).

A tiny and charming hotel in South Kensington. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Athenaeum

116 Piccadilly W1. Phone: 499 3464. Fax: 493 1860. Price: £225 ($341) without breakfast. All major cards. 111 rooms. (D3).

Conveniently located and recently refurbished, sparkling business hotel overlooking Green Park.

The hotel staff is very efficient, specially the concierges. John remembers the names of the guests in spite of their number and daily changes. The breakfast is good and includes a healthy option of müsli, yoghurt, fruits and berries instead of the boring and heavy English eggs and bacon and sausages. There is a health center in the basement and jogging maps for the parks.

Room no. 504 is spacious, with quality furniture and relaxing blue-green colors. It has a sitting area by the windows to the street and park. The bathroom is laid in marble and functions very well.

Basil Street

8 Basil Street, SW3. Phone: 581 3311. Fax: 581 3693. Price: £175 ($265) without breakfast. All major cards. 93 rooms. (C3).

An aristocratic and old-fashioned hotel with an Edwardian country house soul caters especially to women and regulars in a quiet street a few steps from the Harrods department store and the Knightsbridge metro station, a short way from Hyde Park and the Knightsbridge museums.

In the third generation of owners this comfortable hotel is refined all the way from the courteous doorman at the beautiful entrance to the rich antiques in the corridors. The charming rooms are variable and the service is personable. A retreat for women is on he premises, The Parrot Club.

The rather spacious and quiet room no. 231 is in cozy colors and is equipped with quality furniture, including a carved table and an old-fashioned radio and TV set. The large and well-rigged bathroom has cork on the floor, tiles on the walls and wood in the ceiling.

Beaufort

33 Beaufort Gardens, SW3. Phone: 584 5252. Fax: 589 2834. Price: £140 ($212) without breakfast. All major cards. 28 rooms. (C4).

A charming hotel in a quiet place near Harrods. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Berkeley

Wilton Place, SW1. Phone: 235 6000. Fax: 235 4330. Price: £290 ($439) without breakfast. All major cards. 1602 rooms. (C3).

The best hotel in London, even if it is not quite as expensive as the Dorchester and the Claridges. It was built in 1971 and is the sole recently-built super-luxury hotel in the city. This is a castle of the British aristocracy. Most guests seem to wear bespoke outfits and speak with an Oxford accent. Here you wear a tie instead of a camera.

Immediately on the marble floor in the entrance hall we see that this is a different world from the outside. It does not even have the feel of a hotel, as softly spoken young men in city dresses offer a seat at an antique writing -desk during the formalities. The entrance and saloon are in oak. The dining rooms offer outstanding food. And a pretty swimming pool is at the top.

Room no. 329 has a good view out to Hyde Park. It is refined, lovely, roomy and comfortable. The silence is complete in spite of the heavy Knightsbridge traffic outside. The bathroom is spacious, done in marble and tiles, loaded with super-dimensional towels.

Chelsea

17-25 Sloane Street, SW1. Phone: 235 4377. Fax: 235 3705. Price: £190 ($288) without breakfast. All major cards. 225 rooms. (C3).

In a tower just behind the Harrods department store in Knightsbridge, better than many chain hotels. It has a swimming pool.

The hotel has a moveable roof, adapting to weather of each day. Tropical furniture and plants are used to create the impression of the Southern seas beside the pool and in the restaurant above it.

Room no. 705 is spacious and bright with a good view. The appointments are solid both in the room and in the rather cramped bedroom.

Clifton-Ford

47 Welbeck Street, W1. Phone: 486 6600. Fax: 486 7492. Price: £180 ($273) with breakfast. All major cards. 212 rooms. (D1).

Just north of Oxford Street, convenient both for shopping and theater, a good hotel in a modern building.

It has a roomy vestibule and an attractive bar with coats of arms. It is peaceful in spite of being so near the shopping clatter. The personnel is especially friendly and helpful.

Room no. 525 is spacious and conveniently furnished with a tastefully tiled bathroom. This is really a comfortable and a likable haven for London travelers, a modern and an aesthetic room.

Connaught

Carlos Place, W1. Phone: 499 7070. Fax: 495 3262. Price: £240 ($364) without breakfast. All major cards. 90 rooms. (D2).

The most aristocratic hotel and probably the second best hotel in London, in the center of Mayfair. It is so exclusive that you need a recommendation to get in for a first stay, just as you need at Claridges. The difference between the two is that you dont see here any foreigners in travel clothes sporting cameras. De Gaulle lived here during the war. They now take cards.

The luxury is subdued, slow and a little stiff, but perfectly operative. The aged and courteous personnel know their jobs to the fingertips. The drawing room has Victorian gilding and plaster above the antique furniture, which does not match. The oak paneled bar with hunting relics is comfortable. A massive oak staircase leads up to corridors with lovely flower arrangements.

Room no. 223 is capacious, furnished in yellow colors. All appointments are old and tasteful. Mirrors are all over the place. The bathroom is not modern but has all the equipment and plenty of giant towels. By pressing a button you get laundering and pressing done in minutes. The high point of the breakfast in bed is Kedgeree, plucked fish in curry, an English bliss.

Dorchester

Park Lane, W1. Phone: 629 8888. Fax: 409 0114. Price: £280 ($424) without breakfast. All major cards. 247 rooms. (C3).

One of the top hotels in the world, facing Hyde Park. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Dukes

35 St Jamess Place, SW1. Phone: 491 4840. Fax: 493 1264. Price: £240 ($364) without breakfast. All major cards. 64 rooms. (D3).

A charming hotel in a cul-de-sac off St Jamess Street. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Durrant‘s

26 George Street, W1. Phone: 935 8131. Fax: 487 3510. Price: £115 ($174) with breakfast. All major cards. 96 rooms. (C1).

Directly behind the Wallace Collection, about 500 meters from Oxford Street, in an old Regency building, conveniently situate for the Oxford Street shops.

Inside it is full of oak paneling, antiques and old paintings. It looks and feels as you imagine a British club would do. The reception is most amiable.

Room no. 311 is rather cramped but well furnished in a modernist style and has a good bathroom. It is in the older part of the hotel. In the newer part they are simpler and less convenient.

Edward Lear

28-30 Seymour Street, W1. Phone: 402 5401. Fax: 706 3766. Price: £75 ($114) without breakfast. All major cards. (C2).

A well situated and functional hotel of comfortable prices on the northern side of the next street that runs parallel to Oxford Street, just to the west of New Quebec Street.

There is no elevator and service is minimal.

Room no. 11 is clean and relatively spacious, with flowery wallpaper, folding chairs, a tea service and a minimal TV set. The bathroom is fully tiled.

Elizabeth

37 Eccleston Square, SW1. Phone: 828 6812. Price: £70 ($106) without breakfast. No cards. 40 rooms. (D4).

A small hotel near Victoria Station. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Goring

Beeston Place 15, Grosvenor Gardens, SW1. Phone: 396 9000. Fax: 834 4393. Price: £200 ($303) without breakfast. All major cards. 79 rooms. (D4).

Between Buckingham Palace and Victoria Station, a small and quiet luxury hotel in family ownership, boasting of being the first in the world to offer a bathroom and central heating for each of its rooms. Here everything is spotless and well maintained.

This Edwardian hotel carries a solid, old-fashioned aura, reflected in the courteous and amiable staff. Spacious sitting rooms look to a peaceful garden. It is advisable to ask for a room overlooking that garden to avoid the traffic noise at the front.

Room no. 116 is ample and convenient. It has solid furniture and a big bathroom. We first thought there was no washbasin until we noticed that it looked the other way, into the room, where it is in a cupboard. Matching pastel colors make the room very pleasant, at least when the cupboard is closed.

Grosvenor

101 Buckingham Palace Road, SW1. Phone: 834 9494. Fax: 630 1978. Price: £140 ($212) without breakfast. All major cards. 366 rooms. (D4).

British Rail operates adequate and relatively inexpensive hotels at the stations Victoria and Charing Cross, both Victorian in appearance but more modern inside. This one at the Victoria Station is a Victorian palace pile.

The front rooms are imposing as the building itself, with arches, plastering, ornamented columns and a hilarious staircase.

Room no. 608 is a smallish attic room. It has a pervading flowery pattern in curtains, blankets and wall-paper. It could have been a notch cleaner. All amenities in the room and in the bathroom are in perfect condition.

Hazlitts

6 Frith Street, W1. Phone: 434 1771. Fax: 439 1524. Price: £130 ($197) without breakfast. All major cards. 22 rooms. (E2).

Very quaint and antique and comfortable hotel in the main restaurant street of Soho, opposite Bistrot Bruno and dellUgo, very well located for the evening action in the London West End.

There are three staircases and usually two rooms on each floor. Each room is named after a personality in the history of the house. No floor in the hotel is remotely horizontal. The reception is very friendly. Breakfast is served in the rooms, including warm bread, made on the premises. Hotel guests get an outdoor key, as the hotel is locked at all times.

Room Lady Francis Hewitt is wonderfully quaint. It has a canopy bed, antique furniture, dozens of old drawings, a large mirror and two large windows to Frith Street. The bathroom is large, also with dozens of old drawings and a large mirror, and has a Neo-Greek bust in the large window behind the toilet. Everything functions well, both in the room and in the bathroom.

Hospitality Inn Piccadilly

39 Coventry Street/Whitcomb Street, W1. Phone: 930 4033. Fax: 925 2586. Price: £130 ($197) without breakfast. All major cards. 92 rooms. (E2).

In an excellent location, just by Leicester Square, a solid no-frills hotel with large rooms in a decorous Victorian building, entered from Whitcomb Street

The public areas are imposing, almost pompous, with heavy leather chairs in the lobby.

Room no. 601 is very large and rather empty-looking, even if it has the essential furniture, including a desk, a large mirror, two easy-chairs and a trouser press. The bathroom is also large and fully tiled, but not attractive. The room overlooks and overhears Coventry Street. More quiet rooms are available at the back.

Hotel 167

167 Old Brompton Road, SW5. Phone: 373 0672. Fax: 373 3360. Price: £68 ($103) without breakfast. All major cards. 19 rooms. (A4).

A tiny hotel on the main South Kensington street. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

London Mews

2 Stanhope Row, W1. Phone: 493 7222. Fax: 629 9423. Price: £180 ($273) with breakfast. All major cards. 71 rooms. (D3).

Nestling unconspicuously behind the Hilton tower in the southwest corner of Mayfair, well situated for luxury shopping. The old oasis of Shepherd Market is just behind the hotel. It is easy to get a taxi by walking 200 meters to the Hilton entrance.

A marble floor and restful easy-chairs set the tone downstairs, as does the obliging personnel, ready day and night.

The furniture in the smallish room no. 202 is recent and homey, but the carpentry work on the massive pine is not first class. The fully tiled bathroom with a marble floor is well equipped, except for too small towels and a mirror not transparent enough. There is little disturbance from the occasional car in the alley leading to the hotel.

Manzis

1-2 Leicester Street, WC2. Phone: 734 0224. Fax: 437 4864. Price: £65 ($98) with breakfast. All major cards. 15 rooms. (E2).

A tiny hotel above a very good restaurant in the most perfect location in London. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

May Fair

Stratton Street, W1. Phone: 629 7777. Fax: 629 1459. Price: £270 ($409) without breakfast. All major cards. 287 rooms. (D2).

If you stay at the May Fair you dont have to go outdoors, as a theater, a cinema and a nightclub are under the same roof. This may explain the popularity of the hotel with actors and entertainers who sometimes sit in the Victorian bar of this hotel in the south of Mayfair, 200 meters north of Piccadilly.

The vestibule has an agreeable parlor, marble columns, an impressive chrome staircase, an elegant crystal chandelier and amusing engravings from the Twenties above the purple plush in the bar.

Room no. 664 is cozy and warm. The dark hardwood is in unison with the plush Regency easy-chair, the statuette-lamp and two circular table mirrors. The bathroom is fully tiled and has all amenities.

Merryfield

42 York Street, W1. Phone: 935 8326. Price: £48 ($73) with breakfast. No cards. 8 rooms. (C1).

Here is the rock bottom price for a twin room with a bathroom in central London. It is in ten minutes walking distance north from Marble Arch, the west end of Oxford Street.

It is the domain of cheerful Mrs. OBrien who cares for her guests. This is a spotless hotel. And remember to book early.

The rooms are small and snug. The bathrooms are also small, but in perfect condition.

Rembrandt

11 Thurloe Place, SW7. Phone: 589 8100. Fax: 225 3363. Price: £144 ($218) without breakfast. All major cards. 195 rooms. (B4).

A Victorian hotel opposite the Victoria & Albert Museum and the scientific museums of South Kensington and only about 500 meters from Harrods and other important Knightsbridge shops.

The hotel has been renovated and is sparkling. The spacious saloons downstairs are in traditional style, but the commodious bedrooms have acquired a modern look. It is advisable to book at the back as the traffic is heavy on the main street in front.

Room no. 531 is spacious, tasteful and comfortable. It has an ample, fully tiled and a sparkling bathroom.

Ritz

Piccadilly, W1. Phone: 493 8181. Fax: 4932687. Price: £270 ($409) without breakfast. All major cards. 130 rooms. (D3).

A renowned luxury hotel on one of the main streets of central London, near St Jamess Street. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Royal Trafalgar

Whitcomb Street, WC2. Phone: 930 4477. Fax: 925 2149. Price: £140 ($212) without breakfast. All major cards. 108 rooms. (E2).

Smack in the heart of London, between the squares of Trafalgar and Leicester, the touching point of the restaurant, theater and cinema areas of Covent Garden in the east and Soho in the north, and of the shopping districts of St. James and Mayfair in the west, and of the political borough of Westminster in the south. The whole city center lies at your feet.

It is on a few floors in a modern tower alongside the National Gallery. The foyer, reception and front room are small, but attractive, as is the traditional pub, also on the ground floor. The staff is amiable. They give 24 hours service and remember the names of recurrent guests.

Room no. 409 looks to the National Gallery. It is nicely furnished with matching furniture which is just a little beginning to tire. It also has a thick carpet and a pleasant wall-paper. This relaxing room is a silent oasis in the turbulence of the metropolis. The bathroom is partly tiled and has a rather feeble shower.

Selfridge

Orchard Street W1. Phone: 408 2080. Fax: 629 8849. Price: £200 ($303) without breakfast. All major cards. 295 rooms. (C2).

Behind the department store of the same name in Oxford Street, convenient for shopaholists.

Above the pleasant foyer there is a peaceful living room with leather chairs, cedar wood and marble, and a bar with a cast-iron stove and roof beams, giving an impression of bygone days.

The Oxford Street uproar does not reach room no. 509. It is tastefully decorated in classical style, with practical positioning of furniture. The bathroom is modern and fully tiled.

Stafford

16-18 St Jamess Place, SW1. Phone: 493 0111. Fax: 493 7121. Price: £225 ($341) without breakfast. All major cards. 74 rooms. (D3).

At a narrow alley leading off St Jamess Street in the exclusive gentlemens club district of St James. It has complete peace and silence, only a stones throw from the hustle and bustle of St Jamess Street and Piccadilly. In the same alley there is the equally quiet Dukes hotel, approximately in the same class, but with smaller rooms.

An easeful sitting room and a comfortable bar open out to a small flower garden. The hotel is so small that it resembles a country mansion with an army of servants.

Room no. 605 is spacious and richly furnished, partly with antiques. The relaxing wall-paper matches the outfit. Cupboards and luggage-holders are out of sight in order not to diminish the feeling that it would be far more glorious to wallow here in laziness than to do something important in the city. Even the bathroom is so attractive that you want to linger there.

Willett House

32 Sloane Gardens, SW1. Phone: 824 8415. Fax: 730 4830. Price: £90 ($136) for two. All major cards. 17 rooms. (C4).

In the heart of Chelsea in a quiet location just 100 meters off Sloane Square, the Victorian house of the amiable Nunez family.

Some of the rooms have bathrooms and all have TV sets but no direct telephone. They have acceptable furnishings and are very clean.

1996

© Jónas Kristjánsson