Melbourne Hotel: 10 Browning St, West End QLD (07) 3840 9888 or www.themelbournehotel.com.au Melbourne Hotel, in Brisbane’s West End, has been transformed from a tired hotel into a modern venue with a considerable breadth of offerings. It has The Office — an all-day dining area; an upstairs wine bar called Twelve; Tempted café and deli;
Bells at Killcare: 107 The Scenic Road, Killcare Heights NSW www.bellsatkillcare.com.au Up the Pacific Highway from Sydney you’ll discover a touch of Provence on the Central Coast. Or perhaps it’s more Fred Perry-era All-England (croquet anyone?); or even a beach ‘shack’ in the Hamptons — not that I’ve ever been, but I watch a lot
Boutique Stadium? I nearly choked on my Crunchy Nut Cornflakes. I have no idea what a boutique stadium is but according to some bureau-prat on the morning radio, Melbourne needs one. In fact, I’m not sure when we began turning ‘boutique’ into an adjective but it’s made things awkward. Institutions that were previously ‘small’ are
Westin Melbourne: www.westin.com.au/melbourne The Westin loves a good night’s sleep. Some 10 years ago when other five-star hotel marques were braying about their swimming pools, bars or views from the penthouse suite, the Westin was subtly insinuating itself into the minds of the discerning traveller with a fancy mattress. In fact, the Westin was so
When I first heard that France has some peak body that oversees how its language is going, I must confess I had bit of a chuckle — talk about precious. I mean, who really cares if there’s no Gallic word for ‘blue jeans’ or that some snooty Parisienne boulangerie has been taken over by Starbucks
Grand Hotel Rockdale: 482 – 484 Princes Highway, Rockdale NSW (02) 9567 2493 or www.grandhotelrockdale.com.au The Grand Hotel has been trying to follow the changing styles of Sydney and its local patrons for the last 25 years. Southern Hotel Group has taken the hotel through many refurbishments, including a sports bar, and at one time
Goldfish: 111 Darlinghurst Road, Kings Cross NSW (02) 8354 6630 Situated at Kings Cross’ ground zero is the newly refurbished Goldfish, a bar that offers a mix of music, cocktails and food in a comfortable environment with a twist. Its previous incarnation, The Goldfish Bowl, had a solid reputation in the area, and by paying
New Zealand may be the perfect setting for the fantasy genre, but when the Bacardi team needed a mobile way to spruik rum around the disconnected population, a pirate galleon wasn’t going to happen, and a space ship would have been a bit too high-flying for the average punter. In the end, the Bacardi team
I’ve just got back from Hong Kong where I spent a couple of nights at the new W Hotel on Kowloon. What a hotel! Loved it. I’ll tell you all about it next issue but I thought I’d relate one lasting impression: detail. I know attention to detail in design costs good money but, wow,
It seems that Philippe Starck will never run out of venues on which to impose his vision. Declaring the pigeonholed, darkened recording studio to be unfit for working in 12 hours a day, he’s put his hand to Eastwest studios in Hollywood to save it from a similar fate. Founded in 1961, as part of