En cours - Best Accommodation Concept
ACCOR / NOVOTEL
Campaign - Novotel Design revolution, reinforcing our powerful brand
As Accor historic brand, Novotel must continue to remain relevant bringing modernity & premiumization in its design approach, achieved through flexibility, versatility and sustainable development.
Novotel, the founding brand of the Accor group, created more than 50 years ago, is still a dynamic brand with more than 150 openings planned for the next five years. This will add up to the 550 hotels already open in more than 50 countries across the globe. As the founding brand, Novotel must always reinvent itself to remain relevant. modernize and premiumize its network to respond to the clients’ expectations. “Our objective is to achieve a distinctive hotel experience, without any standardization, it is a major evolution for our brand and an unprecedented process for Novotel”.
An international design competition was launched to seek new design solutions to meet the brand expectations. Agencies from all over the world participated identified through our regional offices. From this collaboration with Accor local teams, we selected architects whose core focus is not Hospitality but whose design vision felt relevant and innovative to us. The brief communicated to them was concrete and included very important notions such as modularity, flexibility, versatility and sustainable development. These 4 notions make our design approach both innovative and modern and it meets our customers’ expectations. This is how we are reinventing the design of our historic brand.
4 winners have been selected which represent different regions of the world: RF STUDIO for Europe, the Brazilian agency METRO for Latin America, a Russian agency called Sundukovy Sisters very experienced in the Middle East, therefore representing this region and finally, Hypothesis for Asia Pacific. Based on the same brief, these 4 agencies have succeeded in creating four different design approaches meeting the client’s needs while de-standardizing the brand. In addition to these 4 concepts, a fifth possibility exists for a flagship hotel, respecting structured guidelines in line with Novotel’s values, while freeing itself from the 4 approved concepts. This allows a tailor-made approach for hotel partners or investors, unique to their hotel.
Our design collection pays particular attention to services and the way people are using common spaces in hotel. Hotels are welcome places not only for travelers but also for the local population. With the rise of homeworking, we need to rethink our spaces to offer working and meeting spaces. Public spaces evolved and are no longer qualified as lobbies but as Social Hubs gathering different kinds of people in the same space. We are adjusting to this new way of life. For instance, the customer will be able to check in easily in different areas of the hotel, breaking the code of the classic reception desk.
Let’s come back to the 4 pillars of our concepts and see how they were included in the project.
Flexibility : A collection of 4 design and a tailor-made proposition, Novotel is flexible and knows how to adapt to market evolution.
Modularity : 4 different room types (classic, family, executive & smart rooms) and different sizes of social hubs.
Versatility : the room concept for each project is available at 3 budget levels, (alternative, standard & premium) with adapted finishes and furniture. Our hotel partners will be able to choose depending on their situation – partial (renovations maintaining existing features) or full (full renovations or new built).
Sustainable development : a sustainability assessment tool to help understand ecological impact of the room concept and a strong environmental commitment from the very beginning of the design process.
To summarize, this project aiming at revolutionizing the design approach for a standardized brand like Novotel, is first and foremost, the result of an enhanced collaboration between Accor global & regional offices and with the designers selected all aiming to achieve one thing – ensure Novotel continues to be a strong contender in the current hospitality landscape.