The Mandrake — London, UK

Bedroom featuring neutral tones and dark, olive green seating
(Image credit: Adrien Fouere)

In this age of ironic-minimal hipster home-away-from-home comfort hotels, Rami Fustok’s Mandrake takes hospitality in the opposite direction.

Dark, moody and draped in sumptuous fabrics, with art-filled walls and eclectic (even eccentric) design pieces, it practically swings from the chandeliers. But then The Mandrake is designed as a sensual overload, cocooning guests in fragrance and sound (the former by Azzi Glasser, the latter by Pierre-Arnaud Alunni) and feeding them treats by Frédéric Peneau, who brings his Wan Chai-based ‘democratic French gourmet’ experience, Serge et Le Phoque, to town.

Wrapped around a verdant atrium, with a greenhouse for medicinal plants on the first floor, the hotel takes its botanical inspiration seriously, even serving plant-based cocktails in the bar. Bold and opulent in a wear-your-jewels-in-the-bathtub way, the 30 bedrooms, three suites and lavish penthouse on offer at this hallucinatory homage to hedonism would look quite at home hosting one of Nero’s orgies. 

Alternative view of the bedroom

(Image credit: Adrien Fouere)

Wicker seating area on the veranda surrounded by hanging foliage

(Image credit: Adrien Fouere)

A greenhouse on the veranda houses medicinal plants

(Image credit: Adrien Fouere)

ADDRESS

20-21 Newman Street

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Middle East Editor