The future: A room of spaces

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Colin Seah.

This year's Hotel Show will once again feature the ‘hotel room of the future' concept, designed this year by Ministry of Design founder Colin Seah.

Seah's curved room of glass walls and ‘in-visible spaces' will be on display at this year's Hotel Show, to be held at the Dubai International Exhibition Centre, June 8-10.

The Hotel Show sees regional owner-operators, key decision makers from hotel chains, architects, interior designers and other industry professionals descend on Dubai to find out about the latest products and services available on the market.

The futuristic hotel room design includes a bed chamber, lounge space and a bathtub, which according to Seah has been inspired by the idea that "luxury is not having more space, but having more spaces".

In other words, with curving glass walls that can transform between opacity and transparency separating spaces - and allowing visual privacy where required - the room allows hoteliers to provide guests with more individual spaces without necessitating huge increases in overall room sizes.

Seah will also be a keynote speaker at the Seven Star Conference which runs alongside the Hotel Show.

Other topics on the programme include sustainability, the use of technology in future hotels, staff retention, motivation and development and the latest branding and marketing techniques for F&B outlets.

Hotelier Middle East talked to Seah about his background and his plans for the region.

What is your formal training in the interior design field?

I finished my architectural training in the United States. The rigor of the five-year studies laid an invaluable foundation from which I feel extremely comfortable handling design at a variety of levels, from buildings at the urban scale to small objects you can hold in your hand.

In the years leading up to school, I was very involved in fashion photography and theatre set design as well.

However, formal training aside, I feel that the most valuable form of training happens when you experience life richly and question the things around you.

What projects have you got lined up regionally?

Our presence in the Middle East is rather recent and we are currently exploring the magnitude of opportunities here.

In other parts of the world, we are in discussions for a number of hospitality projects in Bhutan, Thailand and India. Our local projects also include a number of luxury projects such as boutiques, restaurants, houses and an exciting urban office building.

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