Rafayel profiled in the Sunday Observer

Hotel Rafayel on the Left Bank was featured in a prominent article in the Art & Design section of yesterday’s Sunday Observer. The author was Stephen Bayley, the noted design critic and writer who was formerly Chief Executive of the Design Museum. The article has been very well received and has generated many positive comments – for which we are most grateful.

Mr. Bayley wrote that: “Any hotel in this still neglected part of London is a prospect of wonder, but an ecologically intelligent hotel with aspirations to glamour is, to put it no higher, exceptionally noteworthy.... The story of the hotel Rafayel offers real-world insights into the business of architecture today....Iqbal Latif bought the top floors in this 145-room [Falcon Wharf] development and, sensing an interesting opportunity, acquired the freehold. Latif boldly reinstated the idea of a hotel and established the ambitious rhetoric of an "intellectual renaissance in Battersea"....Battersea cannot yet be confused with St Germain. But, for once, a developer is determined to do something interesting. At a time when other developers are pondering ugly, non-viable holes in the ground, this is inspirational."

To read the full article in the Observer please click HERE