The Secrets of Stunning Hotel Gardens

It’s not difficult to pick a good hotel, but it can be virtually impossible to find anywhere that feels like a luxury home from home. So many hotel rooms are cramped and stylised that all you want to do is sleep and shower there. In my opinion, the best hotels have somewhere you can relax, somewhere green, but have a bit more than a fountain in the entrance hall. Here are a few examples of how hotels have taken the potted plant to a new level to create something huge and beautiful.

Hotel Grand Lobby At the Gran Melia – Cancun. Image att: trawin
They don’t have to play by the rules
Some of the most amazing hotel gardens are ones that don’t conform to the regular rules of gardens, for example, being horizontal.
The Pershing Hall Hotel in Paris has one of the most spectacular green walls in the world. It was designed by Patrick Blanc, a French botanist who pioneered the idea in the 80s. This vertical garden was finished in 2001, at the same time as the renovation of the hotel. If you want to marvel at this spectacular expanse of greenery for your whole stay, some of the more premium rooms look out over it. The courtyard below has been turned into an amazing restaurant and bar, topped by a glass roof which slides back in good weather so you can see the full, 30 meter high lush wall. The garden has over 300 species of plants from all over the world, including specimens from the Himalayas, the Amazon and the Philippines to make you think you could be in a tropical rainforest.
The Hotel Lone in Croatia have adopted a similar idea, with a cutting edge installation, aptly named In the Hanging Garden No One Speaks; and it is simply breathtaking. Its two stories of wooden fern filled baskets supported by a bio-machine, and has been designed to grow into a curtain-like structure within a few years. The hotel itself is a design hotel – every wall covering, window pane and bedpost has been designed specifically for the Lone, and the result is clean cut and sharply modern. This only makes the Hanging Garden even more jaw dropping – the contrast between the sleek lines of metal and the lush foliage refuses to be ignored.
Let the setting speak for itself
There are so many hotels with stunning surroundings, but very few take the opportunity to let the natural beauty be, and simply let guests enjoy natures very own garden.
However, the Ubud Hanging Gardens Hotel in Bali has done just that. It leaves the stunning Indonesian jungle to speak for itself, and is best seen by floating in the split level infinity pool that hovers above the foliage. You can also feel good about staying in this hotel, the architect won an award for the eco credentials on this project. Also, if just looking at the plant life is not enough for you there is always the option of going for a jungle trek…
Stay in an eco hotel
Eco hotels don’t just exist in verdant foreign countries; you can also enjoy the greenery they provide in the most concrete of jungles.
The Mint Hotel in London was only opened in early 2011, but has already got people lining up to stay. Perhaps the most eye catching part of the hotel is its sustainable green wall, which is actually the tallest in Europe. It spans 11 floors and 1,025 square meters. The wall has over 40 different species of plants from across the globe to help boost biodiversity, in over 180,000 plants, all watered and fed by a sustainable system. Now that is a lot to look at.
Staying in any one of these hotels is an immersive experience, and although they are all completely different structures, everyone has managed to incorporate life and lushness in to the design of the hotel. So next time you are away from home, think about treating yourself to a stay in something a lifeless box room with a TV, you deserve it.

Jasmine Ayres regularly blogs about her two favourite subjects – travel and botany. She believes that everyone should be able to stay in beautiful, green builds all over the world, and that all hotels should be eco hotels. She’s an expert in the effects of interior landscaping and the simple power of office plants in a working environment.