Belgraves Blog

Ampersand’s senior sales consultant, Mark Wright, recommends the ultimate luxury: staying in a hotel on your home turf! Belgraves provided him with the perfect sexy staycation…

Spending a night in a London hotel when you live in London is truly indulgent. It allows you to forget about the admin of home for a night and it feels like a mini-holiday in your hometown. For this novel and extravagant experience I chose Belgraves. I wanted a place that was centrally located, modern and with views of London that I don’t get in Balham. Belgraves ticked all of those boxes and I was soon to find out it would tick many more…

Belgraves opened in February 2012 and is the first European property from Thompson Hotels, who already run a style-savvy collection of hotels. It is located on Chesham Place, a small, leafy triangle set between the embassies of Belgrave Square and the smart shops of Sloane Street. This is a wealthy, residential area with strollable streets and secret pubs (seek out the Star Tavern in Belgrave Mews West). Nearby attractions include Harrods, the Queen's Gallery and the Royal Court Theatre. Their unique brand style, brought to life by Tara Bernerd, strikes you as soon as you walk into the hotel – from the modern attire of the doorman, the art-inspired lobby and the check-in using the newest iPads. We immediately felt like we had chosen the perfect hotel for us. Our Double Deluxe Room was located on the 9^th floor out of 10, which gave it beautiful view of the city. The room, with an inviting feel of a New York loft, had a heavy wooden door opening up to reveal a king-size bed and marble bathroom.

As with any new hotel room I enter, everything is checked out and thoroughly rifled through! The stand-out features for me were the light flooding in from an oriel window, the purple velvet sofa, and the bedroom and bathroom semi-obscured by sexy metal bead curtain over smoked glass. The room was a tad on the small side, but the design more than made up for it.

New resident chef Sophie Michell  – the youngest executive Chef in Britain – has recently taken over the Belgraves kitchen with Pont St restaurant, which is fast becoming one of London’s social and culinary hotspots. Once we managed to peel ourselves away from the bar we explored the surrounding area, happy in the knowledge that our home-away-from-home was just around the corner and not a tube or bus journey away.

I would highly recommend this hotel to anybody seeking something in the heart of west London that is a bit edgier than the traditional hotels in the area. 

More info here: Belgraves, London