Travel Blog - Mr & Mrs Smith Boutique & Luxury Hotels

I found this great website to make postcards from your own snapshots…

Go to ppme.co.uk, upload your favourite holiday snap, write your own ‘Wish you were here?’ type message and they print and send your image as a postcard for only 99p.

It beats the usual cheesy purple sunset shots and having to find stamps/postbox, plus it gives you a chance to send pics of your progeny to relatives in far-flung lands… here’s one I sent of my wee one in recent trip to New York.

Photo caption: Attack of the monster babies.

Lucy grills Amber about her recent research trip to the Maldives in the Indian Ocean

So, Amber, welcome back: tell us a bit about your trip to the Maldives – was it all lying about on beaches catching rays (my guess, judging by your tan, which is still astonishing after a week back in Grey Britain)?

Well it was certainly about catching rays (sun rays, not manta rays or sting rays, although we saw plenty of both), but we were there to check out Cocoa Island and Huvafen Fushi for Mr & Mrs Smith’s collection of boutique hotels and luxury resorts in the Maldives, plus my Mr Smith [DJ Rob Wood – also our TuneSmith] was doing music consultancy for Huvafen Fushi whilst we were there. Oh, and we were taking a bit of a holiday as well!

I see <jealous pause>. Did you have a favourite beach?

The Maldives isn’t a destination that HAS beaches. It’s a destination that IS beaches – each resort is its own tiny island. Cocoa Island is only 350 metres long by 100 metres wide; it’s not like you can ‘go to the beach’ – you’re already on it! All floors of all public areas, restaurants etc in most resorts are sand, and it is physically impossible to wear anything on your feet other than flip flops (I didn’t even bother with those).

Actually, my chosen sunbathing spot at both Cocoa Island and Huvafen Fushi wasn’t the beach but our own private deck. At Huvafen this featured our own freshwater plunge pool, but both decks gave us direct access to the aquamarine, bath-warm sea – it was so quiet and private: the ultimate luxury….

Green. With. Envy. OMG, just look at the colour of the water in that snap of you… Go on, rub it in a bit more – are the Maldivian islands really as beautiful as they look in the pictures?

They really are – even after a long flight (it’s 10 hours in total, usually via Dubai), coming in to land at Malé is like flying over paradise. The Maldives are truly breathtakingly beautiful, even if you’re staying in a hut! Actually, having said that, I wouldn’t have been happy in a hut. Which is lucky really because both Cocoa Island and Huvafen Fushi are absolutely dreamy. That’s me at Huvafen Fushi, BTW.

Where exactly in the Maldives is that? Any bits of your journey there particularly intrepid?

The Maldives is actually quite difficult to find your way around – so many teeny islands (almost 2,000 in total) dotted across 19 atolls – but we were lucky to be spending half our time in the South Malé Atoll and half our time in the North Malé Atoll, neither of which is too difficult to reach from the airport and capital at Malé. We did all our travelling by luxury speedboat, and whilst I usually loathe boats, I surprised myself by really enjoying the journeys. Spotting dolphins on the way to and from Cocoa Island definitely helped, as did the hunky be-headscarfed Maldivian crew of Huvafen Fushi’s luxury launch….

Tsk, and what does Mr Smith have to say about that?! Moving swiftly on… Would you recommend island-hopping in the Maldives, or is it better to stick to one resort?

The two islands we stayed on (Cocoa Island and Huvafen Fushi) would make the perfect two-hotel pairing for a Smith getaway – they’re both half an hour in opposite directions from Male, so it only took us just over and hour to get from one to the other, and whilst they’re both beautiful and luxurious retreats, they’re a total contrast in style and ambience. Huvafen Fushi really has the wow factor, with high-tech gadgets for Mr Smith to fiddle with and private plunge pools in all the rooms. It’s very very cool, and the staff team on the island are great fun.

That whole resort is renowned for its luxurious atmosphere – any other particularly decadent features?

Huvafen Fushi is the perfect place for those that take their hedonism seriously. Their spa is to die for, and has super-cool underwater treatment rooms. When you check in, you are introduced to your own Thakuru, or Maldivian Butler, whose mobile number is pre-programmed into your room’s phone. They’ll pick you up at the drop of a hat and zoom you wherever you want to go in a golf buggy, and generally help you with anything you need (even obtaining a replacement contact lens in my case - thanks Nashath!).

They have a fabulous underground wine cellar where GM Marc, who is a brilliant host, holds an amazing dinner every Thursday, surrounded by 6,000 bottles of wine. There are loads of other decadent aspects of Huvafen, but half the fun is discovering them for yourself, so I’m not going to spoil it…. Apart from to say, ask them about spending the night on a dhoni, stargazing from Lonu Veyu (a little sea pool) and eating in their ‘secret’ restaurant, Cardamom Lounge….

And how is Cocoa Island different from Huvafen Fushi?

By contrast, Cocoa Island is a much quieter, far more understated take on luxury: privacy is highly valued and respected. It’s a very special place. The rooms (all set out over the water) are breathtakingly beautiful – all white panelled walls and crisp linen awnings that float in the breeze. We stayed in a one-bedroom villa, the most spacious and private room type…

Ooh, get you!

It’s a tough job… but I had a nosey around rooms in all the different categories, and I can safely say they’re all lovely, but my other favourite was definitely the Dhoni Loft Suites, Cocoa Island’s second-cheapest room type….

I know you’re a beach bunny by nature, but did you get up to anything much other than lying supine on the sunlounger?

Hmm, not really! Although I treated myself to some gorgeous spa treatments (for professional research purposes only you understand). Cocoa Island features the Como Shambhala spa, where focus is on Ayurvedic influences and aromatheraputic treatments. And Huvafen Fushi’s gorgeous over-the-water spa uses a little-known range of products from Australia called Li’tya, which I loved discovering.

And just because I didn’t want to do anything particularly strenuous doesn’t mean you can’t: it goes without saying that water sports are right on your doorstep, snorkelling, diving, all boxes ticked.

Ok – I think we’ve heard quite enough from you about your ‘work’! I’m off to have another look at the Maldives collection (and maybe check availability for December!)

It’s that magic time of the month again – we’ve just launched a whole host of luxurious boutique hotels in some of the furthest-flung corners of the world. It’s a mixed bag (in terms of geography, not quality, naturally), covering four continents, eight countries, and one very hefty air fare bill (carbon-offset, of course)

Most excitingly, we’ve extended our Indian Ocean collection, with some astounding new hotels in Mauritius and the Seychelles that Laura pinned down for us. We’ve also made our first foray into that textbook desert-island paradise, the Maldives, where we sent our intrepid hotel-hunter Amber, who worked exceedingly hard downing cocktails rooting out the finest hospitality on the islands, and who has personally penned not one, but two reviews of her finds – Huvafen Fushi and Cocoa Island.

Continuing the desert-island-holiday theme, we’re also unveiling some great-value Caribbean luxury on St Barths at La Banane, a boutique collection of beautiful jungle bungalows, and (dropping the island but keeping the desert), we’re making on good on last month’s promise, and bringing you a fantastic polo-estate hotel in Dubai. Editorial wizardette Lucy has left her thoughts here.

Last, but most decidedly un-least, Katy’s found a pair of super-sexy hideaways in southern Spain (Marbella’s on the up, dontchaknow?), we’re delighted with some supremely swish suites in Istanbul, and editor Rufus has been traipsing the stylish streets of Berlin in search of modern minimalist marvellousness. He found it at Lux 11.

Phew…

So, to sum up: Laura’s been to the Seychelles, Amber’s been to the Maldives, Lucy’s been to the Middle East, Katy’s been to Spain and Rufus has been to Germany. I’m not envious, though. Oh no. I mean, I’m off to the sun-kissed beach-side paradise of Brighton in a week or two. Will keep you posted…

Since the launch of the Smith route-planner and our top luxury UK road-trips not so long ago, we’ve been thinking a lot about the lure of the open road, the thrill of the wind in the hair, and the enduring 80s awfulness of soft-rock service-station drive-time compilation albums.

Thus far, we’ve thought exclusively about journeys within the UK, but anyone who’s seen the opening credits to the Italian Job knows that mainland Europe has some breathtakingly scenic routes, from the sinuous curves of the Amalfi Coast, to the Mediterranean windings of the Côte d’Azur between Nice and Monte Carlo. European driving holidays are on the up, according to the people behind the Broughton’s GT (the big daddy of luxury road-trips), partly due to a combination of increasing airline prices and credit-crunch yadiyadiyada…

Driving in Europe is not always plain, er, sailing, however, and it’s not just down to the population of Italy’s collective decision to re-enact Days of Thunder on its roadways. There are plenty of road hazards on the Continent that don’t take the form of wayward Vespas – driving regulations in certain countries can throw a few spanners in the engine too.

In France and Spain for instance, the legality or otherwise of your chosen parking spot depends upon the time of the month. Between the 1st and 15th of a given month, you can park on one side of the street, afterwards you can only park on the other. Woe (and towing)

betide those who don’t read the signage.

Other potential pitfalls include the fact that cruise control is illegal in Belgium, and rude hand gestures in Germany carry a fine. If you get out of your car on an Italian motorway, you’d better be wearing a reflective jacket (but that may just be a sign that the polizia have limited fashion sense).

However, all of these pale in comparison to the UK’s own oddball contribution to global auto legislation, which permits male drivers to urinate in public, as long as he aims at the rear wheel, and keeps his right hand is in contact with the vehicle. Aren’t you happy to know that?

So – anyone care to add to our database of car-based Euro legislative surreality? Or do you have a favourite road-trip in Europe. Please feel free to share below…

So - yesterday, I had lunch with John Hitchcox at Electric House (of Soho House Group fame). You may not know his name but you will certainly have heard of:

a) at least one of his building projects (Jia, The Gramercy – not to be confused with Ian Shrager’s New York hotel).

b) his business partner, design genius Philippe Starck.

His company, Yoo, creates amazing developments all around the world - from apartment buildings to hotels – on a grand scale.

We were chatting about the growing trend in stylish self catering - something we’ve explored with Smith and Friends. One of John’s most recent projects is the Lakes by Yoo,  a 650-acre site just an hour and a half from London in the Cotswolds.

The area used to be a series of quarries, but they’ve now been filled and landscaped to create beautiful lakes surrounded by lush greenery. Also planned for the site are cycle paths, a private swimming pool, fishing spots, a 100-suite hotel and several dozen lakeside houses (some of which will make fabulous stylish self-catering properties). With Jade Jagger and Philippe Starck involved in various elements of the design, as well as John’s own team, it’s guaranteed to turn a few heads. We can’t wait to see the end result.

Thanks for lunch John!

Mark Jolly is founder and editor of globorati.com, a brilliant online resource for globetrotting travellers who have expectations that go somewhat beyond those of your average backpack-toting wanderer. This luxury-travel newsfeed reports on upcoming travel trends and cutting-edge hotel design, covering topics from glamping in the Golden Triangle to Mongolia’s manliest man contest (I’ve got my ticket already. Actually it’s in the same place as the Mongol Rally finish line, where Smith’s very own Team Clouseau gamely/foolishly took a 2CV last year. But I digress).

Mr & Mrs Smith caught up with Mr Jolly himself last week to quiz him on all things wide-spread and wonderful…

So, Mark, tell us how globorati.com came into being – why did you start it?

Before globorati.com, upscale travellers had literally nowhere to get a daily scoop on the world’s hottest new hotels and travel experiences. I still wear my contributing-editor cap for Condé Nast Traveler (US), and I love diving deep into a destination and writing big feature stories, but the fact is, it’s a monthly magazine. The world of luxury travel moves faster than that and so I wanted to find a voice that spoke to those travellers who are looking for the latest and the greatest trips from a credible source.

Those three-month print lead times for the monthly glossies do kill the spontaneity somewhat… Ok, let’s put your trend-radar to the test: give us your travel-trend predictions for 2009. We’re guessing we might hear the words ‘credit crunch’ in there…

The growth of green travel and the rising cost of air travel will be even bigger stories in 2009. But what’s interesting is how these two factors have sparked the romance of train travel again. The Eurostar has dramatically reversed the air-domination of journeying from London to Paris. And just look at Spain: the new high-speed train from Madrid to Barcelona has already stolen one-fifth of Iberia’s business.

In the luxe market, we’re seeing more and more one-of-a-kind train journeys — often billed as overland “cruises” — which pile on the pampering and customized services but without the guilt of long-haul air travel. This includes the new Danube Express, the Great Brazil Express (Brazil’s first ever luxury train), and Australia’s coast-to-coast Platinum service on Great Southern Rail.

We love train travel at Smith - especially since so there are so many fantastic Smith hotels accessible by Eurostar or TGV connections. Actually I’d love to replicate the old Orient-Express route from London to Istanbul by train; apparently it’s a corker of a journey. Although I wouldn’t say no to a bit of Great Brazil Express action either – double beds and 24-hour room service in your berth? Now you’re talking!

On the subject of all-out spoiling and ultra-luxurious travel, what’s the most outrageous luxury travel story you’ve reported on the site?

Most of what globorati covers is focused on useful, up-to-the-moment stories that capture the thrill and beauty of travel. But every now and again we’ll run something on a big-ticket, through-the-roof, ultra-luxe experience. The sort of stuff I call “sick travel” — stuff like a $700 breakfast at the new Ritz-Carlton Moscow, or a $30,000 private-jet expedition to Antarctica, or a $50,000 one-night package at the Four Seasons Miami (the massage uses lotion infused with ground diamonds). The other day, we ran a story on a $1 million vacation to Dubai.

And there was that piece in The Times the other day about a couple spending £15,000 a night to stay in the suite on the bridge linking the two halves of the usually sane Sol Kerzner’s crazy Atlantis-themed Palm Island hotel project. That’s B&B though, so at least they saved on croissant costs, eh? Somewhere else I saw a story about the Bottler, a centrifugally weighted (gimballed) gold-plated champagne holder for keeping your bubbly upright aboard your posh yacht – one guy’s having his covered in crystals too, as if a gold gizmo wasn’t enough. Hotel-meal treats in such places – afternoon tea at Dubai’s seven-star Burj al Arab for example – don’t exactly come cheap, either. Now Abu Dhabi’s Emirates Palace hotel is muscling in on the act, offering a seven-day holiday that costs – to borrow Dr Evil’s vernacular – one million dollars! Crazy. Or rather, ’sick’, as you put it.

Assuming it’s not Atlantis or the Emirates Palace, then, what’s your favourite hotel, and why?

I fall in love with different hotels for different reasons. I recently stayed at Hotel Caruso in Ravello. Even by Orient-Express standards — they’re the owners — there’s something special about this place. It’s an 11th-century villa whose guestbook includes the names of Humphrey Bogart, Jackie Kennedy and Graham Greene. It’s got the most photogenic infinity pool hanging over the Salerno hills. And the whole place smells so damn good — our private terrace was stuffed with jasmine and white roses.

Mm, that must have had an amazing scent… really seductive. And that infinity pool – what views! What’s the most romantic place you’ve ever been?

Actually, if you know a more romantic town than Ravello, I’d love to know where it is. It’s the only genuine jewel-box on the Amalfi Coast — set back from the coastal road, and away from the circus that swarms Amalfi and Positano. Ravello must be sprinkled with some sort of fairy dust – it’s a compact, quiet medieval town, blessed with some of the most stunning cliffside gardens you’ll ever see. Oh, yes, and it has the Hotel Caruso!

We visited Ravello once during a stay in Sorrento – it’s an amazing place. Describe your perfect weekend away – where do you go, what do you do when you get there?

Formentera is my favorite island in the Mediterranean — it’s dislocated from the Spanish mainland, with no airport (you must take a boat from Ibiza), and not a single traffic light anywhere. The powder-white sands and crystalline sea make me feel like I’m in the Caribbean — minus the masses. It’s magnificent for beach and village-hopping by scooter — and if you recognize the rugged unspoilt land it’s because you may have seen it in the movie Sex and Lucia.

What about your own corner of the world: where do you live?

I’m a product of English-Iranian parents, and I now divide my time between three cities — Valencia, London and New York. Valencia’s Mercado Central is a five minute walk from my house in the historic centre (Barrio del Carmen), and it’s the most exquisite food hall in Spain (sorry, Barcelona, but that includes the Boqueria). It’s the first place I’d take a visitor to the city: It’s this magical modernista nexus loved by locals and visitors in equal measure. And its’ two-year restoration is nearly complete.

Anything that combines eating and shopping is alright by us! Thanks so much for chatting to us Mark – look forward to reading about the next big travel things on globorati.com!

If you happen to reading this on your iPhone, you’ll already know what I’m about to say –  namely, that you can now read Mr & Mrs Smith’s ever-lovelier blog on pocket-sized screens around the world in an Apple-friendly format, with no risk of compatibility snag-ups or slow-load nightmares. Whether you have an iPhone or an iPod Touch, you’ll find the Smith blog looks and functions just like Apple’s own software. Just like the day we launched the hotel-finder BlackBerry application, the half of Smith HQ that understands the phrases ‘WordPress plug-in’ and ‘mobile user interface’ is practically whooping with technophile glee.

Of course, unlike the BlackBerry application, we can’t take credit for the work on this one. The clever blogbods at Brave New Code have tinkered and tweaked to come up with WPtouch, a snippet of plug-in code that immediately iPodifies your pages. We’d encourage all you WP bloggers out there to get in on the action. And why wouldn’t you, when it makes your blog look like this?

Boutique hotels were only the beginning; now Mr & Mrs Smith have taken to the roads too. You might have spotted a wee piece in Grazia the other week (the one sporting a delightfully floral Cameron Diaz on the cover)  about boutique road trips – the Smith team have road-tested seven great drives all over the UK, from the Cotswolds to Poolewe, and written up their travels to cover everything from gastropub stop-offs to baby-changing facilities.

So, whether you fancy cruising the valleys of West Wales, exploring Windermere and the Lake District or just a gentler run on the South Downs, Smith’s got it covered.

Of course, there are far more than seven great luxury road trips in the UK, and we can’t possibly do all of them (chance’d be a fine thing), so, together with some very friendly folk at Saab, (who kindly lent us their cars to test the trips in), we’ve also been beavering away at an online route planner.

It’s a nifty tool that lets you map your own trip from any A to any B in the UK – and includes the best restaurants to stop off at, the best sights to see, and the best boutique hotels to bed down in for the night. You can even choose to avoid motorways.

As with any complicated web gadgetry, there’s been a glitch or two on the way, but the Smith route planner is up and running and, to put it bluntly, we’re chuffed to bits with it.

We’d love your feedback though, so please let us know what you think. And if you too have any great ideas  for road trips – anywhere in the world – we’d love to hear them.

On Saturday, when the Guardian ran a little piece about some of Smith’s boutique hotels in the South-of–France wine country, James and I were enjoing a glass or two over lunch at The Olde Bell in Hurley, Berkshire. It’s a return to the age-old idea of the ‘inn’, not a hotel where the rooms usually dominate but where the bar and restaurant are the heartbeat of the place. It’s been given a new identity by Ilse Crawford, the designer and creative director behind Babington House and the other ultracool properties in the Soho House Group ). The inn used to be an unappealing hybrid of Travellodge and Campanile (those awful French roadside inns) but Ilse has redesigned, revamped and completely cleaned it out; it’s now an amazing place to be.

The bedrooms are spacious enough, clean and simple with drench showers and lovely natural touches – wool throws and real custom-made rush matting which give off a welcoming fresh smell. The garden has been wrenched from its crazy-paving/rockery days and given a makeover, leaving huge oak tables dotted around under the trees, an awning and a summer kitchen serving a delicious barbecue. More attractive still, half the garden has been sewn as a wild meadow – simply stunning.

Also at lunch were Chris and Martin from the Future Laboratory (seriously bright guys who predict upcoming trends). They were telling us how they’d been looking into the future of the hotel industry and where it would go from the ’boutique boom’ of recent years. Martin told me that the problem with the boutique hotel phenomenon is that so many people were building/renovating boutique hotels these days that genuine quality is now hard to find - too many people do boutique-by-numbers. All their spies (they have 3,000 around the world) were telling them that the next big thing was going to be ‘inns’ – pubs with rooms. The Olde Bell is the perfect example.

Reminds me of where we were last weekend: in Gatcombe, Gloucestershire where another foodie inn has just been renovated and given a new lease on life - The Ragged Cot. We’re never ones to miss a trick (or a trend), of course, so you can look forward to seeing both The Ragged Cot and The Olde Bell on the Smith site in the next month or two.

What do you think? Are Chris and Martin right? And do you have any favourite inns around the UK?

(Image of the Olde Bell courtesy of Lisa Cohen)

Darren Cronian is the editor of Travel Rants, an award-winning consumer travel blog. He started writing in April 2005 after a frustrating experience booking a holiday with a high-street travel agency and has since been blogging his socks off about pretty much every conceivable aspect of travel.  We asked him to write a few words about the things that most annoy him when searching for a hotel…

As a kid I vividly remember my parents queuing up at the tourist information office, who would telephone a few hotels to check availability, and then we’d drive around trying to find the hotel in the nicest location for a weekend break at the seaside.

How times have changed.

The internet has really transformed how we search for and book hotels, but let’s be honest: while it doubtlessly has many advantages, there are some really annoying things about searching for hotels online and I wanted to share these annoyances with you today.

Frustrating search forms

I noticed on a number of hotel sites that the search isn’t intuitive – if I enter an arrival date, and I want to stay for 3 nights, I shouldn’t then have to enter a check-out date. Like many travellers I am flexible with the dates of travel, so I’d like to see the site check availability for a few days prior and after if there’s no availability for my chosen search dates.

Out-of-date availability calendars

There’s nothing more annoying than finding the perfect hotel, paying online, then receiving a phone call to inform you that the hotel is booked up. I have lost count how many times this has happened to me in the last couple of years, and it seems to happen with one or two hotel chains in particular, both of which I refuse to use now.

Hotel listings without photos or poor quality

One of my main annoyances are hotel listings with poor quality photos, or worse still no photos at all.  How am I going to trust a hotel  that has not made the effort to provide photographs?  I need inspiring and photos are one of the biggest factors in my decision to book.

Poorly written hotel descriptions

One-line or  poorly written hotel descriptions are not going to catch my imagination – I want to read what services the hotel provides  (e.g. is there WiFi? does the room have a television? is there a gym or bar on site? It’s amazing how many hotel descriptions don’t cover this or are simply badly written.

Local currencies only

When booking hotels abroad, I don’t want to have to visit a currency converter website to view the rates in pounds – I will just go elsewhere.  I’ve found this happen more on individual hotel websites, rather than hotel search engines.

Hard-to-read maps

Nowadays there’s no need to have a badly designed map when the likes of Yahoo and Google offer maps which you can embed into your hotel’s website.  You’d be surprised how many hotel sites I have visited that provide a map that’s so hard to read I end up going to another mapping site to find the hotel’s location.

Confusing hotel ratings

I’ve ranted about this issue before, and I’d like to see a more uniform hotel classification system in the EU. On a recent search of hotels in London I found hotels classified with both diamonds and stars, which completely confused me, and I am sure it confuses many a tourist.

Poor customer communication channels

It’s 2008, the age of the internet, so why should I have to dial a premium telephone number to speak to someone? I’m amazed at the number of hotel sites that do not provide an email form, or even a page of frequently asked questions that I can refer to.

If there’s anything I haven’t mentioned that riles you, please add it in the comments. Hopefully we can help improve the experience.