Hotel will have beehives on the roof

BY TOBY PORTER toby@slpmedia.co.uk

A six-storey glass 161-bedroom hotel with interiors by the designer who helped create Oscar-winning film Dances With Wolves, is to open in September next year.

Bankside, in Blackfriars Road, is one of five big hotels opened in the area this year, or near completion.

This one has rooftop beehives, sustainably-sourced wood and non-or low-solvent paints to make it as sustainable as possible.

Film set producer-turned interiors architect, Dayna Lee of Powerstrip Studios, is creating the interiors which will feature a mid-20th  century theme. Lee, who dressed the sets of 1990 Kevin Costner blockbuster Dances With Wolves and Dragon – The Bruce Lee Story, said that the aim was to design “a boutique hotel for the modern mindset, with calm rooms and creative public spaces that reflect the history-steeped community of SE1.”

The concept is designs reflecting local art and craftsmanship.

Featured artwork from the community will include post-kiln pottery drying racks for shelves and kid-leather-covered furnishings. It is being developed as part of the One Blackfriars development by St George, Berkeley Group on behalf of the owners, the Canadian property investment company realstar and Amerimar Enterprise, a US-based company.

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The hotel will be managed by Amerimar Enterprises, which currently operates the four-AA-star, 331-bedroom St Ermin’s hotel in Westminster.

It will feature a 78-cover restaurant, al fresco dining space, bar, lounge, gym and function space for 120 guests. Lambeth has three hotels under construction and five have planning permission.

A total of 776 rooms were added from 2011-15. Most of the existing ones and new hotels are concentrated in Waterloo.

Lambeth’s Local Plan Review shows the borough already has 26 hotels. In 2015, it was the local council with the 10th highest number of properties totally turned over to Air BnB, with more than 1,000 advertised at any one time.

The South Bank also has the 202-bedroom Shangri-La at the Shard, opened in 2014, and the 292-bedroom Hilton Bankside, opened in 2015 and the 494-bedroom Park Plaza Waterloo, launched in June this year.

Also opening in the area next year is the 192-bedroomed Hoxton Southwark. Consultation on the Lambeth Local Plans ends on December 4.