TIME Global Adviser Foxy
Little Number A Copenhagen hotel
facelift results in some pleasant—and wildly
original—surprises BY NICHOLAS
COLDICOTT
HOTEL FOX
Saturday, May. 14, 2005 Room 117 is a Pop Art
pastiche of a murder scene. Room 105 has a mock surveillance camera
tracking visitors to the bathroom. And Room 409 is a shrine to Swiss
mountain sprite Heidi. This is Copenhagen's Hotel Fox, tel: (45)
3313 3000—comprising the work of 21 designers from four continents.
They were brought together as part of a marketing exercise by
Volkswagen, which asked the group to transform the former Park
Hotel—a 61-room property in the center of the Danish capital—into a
venue for the three-week launch of the automaker's latest runabout,
the Fox.
The
event concluded last month, but—happily for design fans—the hotel is
contractually obliged to keep the new name and look for another five
years. Don't expect to see VW motifs scattered around, however. The
artists were given free rein to style the hotel as they saw fit. In
the case of Australian designer Rilla Alexander, that meant placing
a tent in Room 121. As for Room 414, the whimsicality begins with
the inscription on the door, showing a pseudo-scientific claim: 92%
OF ALL HOTEL GUESTS EXPECT NO SURPRISES WHEN ENTERING THEIR ROOM.
That may be true of most hotels, but Hotel Fox is a delightful
exception to the rule.
From the May. 23,
2005 issue of TIME Global Advisor
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