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What it looks like when Hyatt Centric enters India

Bangalore — or Bengaluru, to give it its official name — is a city that rolls with the zeitgeist. In the one-time garden city, now the heart of India’s Silicon Valley, temples and traditional street vendors vie with craft breweries, imaginative cocktails and an idiosyncratic dining scene. Into this mix comes the first Hyatt Centric in India, on the historic MG (Mahatma Gandhi) Road, opened in May. 

Created for “millennial-minded” travelers who want to be at the heart of the action, Hyatt Centrics are located in the center of each of their 23 worldwide destinations, designed to be launch pads for guests to see, taste and feel everything a city has to offer. Rahul Shankhwalker, partner in design firm Studio HBA, says the goal for this particular hotel, formerly the Hyatt Bangalore, was “to curate an?experience for guests that was?unequivocally Bangalorean.”  

“The most interesting and challenging part of the project, as India’s first Hyatt Centric, was how to adapt the American brand to a local context,” he says. “There was quite a lot of research involved in the narrative, the historical context of the area and how we could make the brand accessible to a wide-ranging audience.”
Lounge area at the Bangalore Hyatt Centric
Lounge area at the Bangalore Hyatt Centric

Local context

“We first sought to understand the brand ethos, then how the space is used, how it is designed, what it looks like and how this physical manifestation would engage the profile customer,” Shankhwalker says. “We researched the neighborhood and local context to create the narrative through storytelling, which was important to define the soul and personality of the hotel and the opportunities for memory creation for its guests.” 

The hotel’s General Manager Varrun Mohan says, “The hotel is expected to attract both business and leisure segments, defined by the urge to be located in the heart of the city where the action is. This is more of a lifestyle choice rather than segmented by age, nationality or occupation.”

Shankhwalker’s design philosophy caters precisely for this. “We are designing for an ‘attitude, not an age’; a guest who thinks differently and seeks novel, local and real experiences, and values memories over physical objects,” he says. 
Bangalore is home to more than a million IT specialists, so the business case for this property in this cosmopolitan city is compelling even before factoring in the international traveler. Location is key to the brand identity of a Hyatt Centric hotel, Mohan explains. 

“A trip to Bangalore city would never be complete without a visit to MG Road, whether for business or leisure,” he says. “Being housed in the most premiere commercial and social address, ‘MG Road,’ the brand and the hotel were a perfect match. The address and location became the forerunners for the business case.”

The style of the property taps into the current trend for social space. According to Mohan, “With the advent of the ‘millennial traveler,’ the lines between work and play have blurred. Technology platforms available today allow us to keep in touch, both socially and professionally. The Hyatt Centric brand with its relaxed yet efficient service philosophy and shared creative spaces encourages and synergizes this concept of work and play.”

Shankhwalker gives an example: “We wanted to create a sense of community in the lobby based around the concept of the Tea Khade, a communal tea drinking spot on Indian streets, including Bangalore. It’s almost everywhere you go, and is also a place to meet people and socialize. We wanted the lobby to have a similar feeling of inclusiveness.”
A guest room at the property
A guest room at the property

Ramping up

The property has made a good start in its new incarnation but does not yet have comparative data.

“The hotel rebranded recently and is currently in its ramp-up phase,” says Mohan. “There is a clear strategy to grow our business through both ADR and volumes in the coming months. This is being done through a combination of key partnerships with corporate houses as well as dynamic seasonal (best available rate) pricing… The hotel has seen a positive growth in the guest satisfaction scores post rebranding, suggesting that the existing service style, look, feel and décor of the property is well received and appreciated.”

The design seeks to reflect the vibrant city outside its doors. “When Studio HBA began the project, the team of designers explored the city to try to define what was at the heart of Bangalore,” Shankhwalker says. “They did not need to venture far, as the hotel’s immediate vicinity is bustling with historical layers and vibrancy. “The design features draw inspiration from the street graffiti, signage, materials, textures and colors from the surrounding area, and the juxtaposition of the old and the new captures of spirit of the context.”
To create a hotel that truly feels Bangalorean, Studio HBA designed the hotel through a narrative created around a central character. In researching design inspiration for the hotel, designers found a stenciled piece of street art of a traditional elderly Indian woman riding a Harley-Davidson Chopper. The design team reimagined this image as the ideal metaphor for the city and the hotel’s personality. 
In the 143 guest rooms, the main feature is the stenciled graffiti featuring traditional characters in contemporary scenarios. In one, a classical dancer plays an electric guitar; in another, a woman in a sari rides a motorcycle; and in another, a woman wearing a dhoti rides a skateboard while gripping the side of an auto rickshaw.
Design touches were also inspired by the surroundings — bathroom tiles, baroque furniture details inspired by the Indo-Saracenic era, colorful hand-painted trunks and globe lights inspired by the street lamps in the British cantonment.  
The hotel's reception area
The hotel’s reception area

Local craft

Shankhwalker describes the Hyatt Centric as a “made in India” hotel. “It is a fertile business proposition that explores alternative streams of revenue,” he says. “The hotel functions as a gallery for the city’s startups and showcases local products and talent. We curated objects from local designers, craftsmen and companies from south India that were doing interesting work. For example, the styling of the hotel — handmade objects that are unique to the region – embroidered pillows, jute baskets, rugs, artwork, etc. Also coffees, tea, organic juices, chocolate. These objects are curated for purchase and the guest thereby interacts with the products and supports the local economy.”
The hotel is not just socially responsible, it is “resource-responsible,” Shankhwalker adds. 

“We sought to rethink how the public areas could be adaptive to suit the needs of guests without making spaces redundant,” he says. “For example, the lobby serves not only as a seating area and space for checking in guests, but a co-working space and a cafe. The reception functions not only as a check-in counter but a retail space where objects showcased in the hotel can be purchased. When the spa is not in use, it becomes a sleep pod for a guest to rest if they arrive before check-in time. It was really important for us as designers to make each space revenue-generating and multiplicitous.”

Looking to the future, Mohan says, “The quest for personalized experiences will always resonate with travelers. While the concept of immediacy of service and standards is important, it is the personal connection that a guest shares with a hotel, that keeps them returning. The winning formula in today’s day and age would be a perfect marriage between new technological platforms which help sustain and develop personalized experiences.”
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