Cool?

There are several kinds of cool places. Tokyo, New York, London are arguably beehives of global creativity, places where things start. Then you have the Singapores, LAs, maybe Barcelonas – places which take in things that originate elswhere, or perhaps originate things on their own, but without the global reach of the first tier global cities. Hong Kong and Seoul would be trapped somewhere between the two categories, creative enough to be influential but without the power to extend their influence globally.

And then you have everything else, the local, non cosmopolitan, cities – perhaps tuned-in consumers (Bangkok), or perhaps untuned, uncreative locals such as most of the US (disturbing parochialism).

Do you create, do you imitate, do you consume, do you ignore?

Not sure how this fits in Richard Florida’s work – it does on some level I’m sure

Citrus

…is a hip hotel in Kuala Lumpur.

The Petronas Towers come with the package

Does that make me a hip-hotel-spotter? Maybe, but if I could live all my life in places such as this, preferably moving from one to another (say, Dream – Citrus – perhaps Sparks – …), I would be very happy. I just like the feeling of walking into the lobby, of checking into the neon lit room, then going out for a night about town.

Wallpaper* have their own rankings, some of which I do, some of which I don’t agree with – I’m not into the heavily ornated style of the hotel in Florence, for example. The Park Hyatt Shanghai is nice though, just as the Tokyo one where I was going to stay (or not).

Someday.

Is it a mall? Is it a metro station? Is it a dome?

I’m not sure if another mall was necessary, but I have to agree the architecture is indeed very cool. I can’t think of any place in the US or in Europe (with few exceptions, London, perhaps Berlin and Barcelona) where they are still building futuristic stuff like here (and Dubai, before the crash).

Welcome to a domed construction thing

Singapore hip hotels

Not only Bangkok, but Singapore too has its hip hotels. Perhaps fewer for a city of its stature, but…

• New Majestic Hotel in Chinatown (uhh name)
• Gallery Hotel somewhere near Boat Quay I seem to recall
• as to Re!, it’s about as hip as Pod Hotel in NY, which is to say, it’s trying hard and somewhat achieving, but there are limitations as to how much you can remake a rather bland building. Similar to grandkemang, too.

Why a ’style’ tag by the way? Well I’m not into clothing – design, architecture, and cool hotels are about as close to ’style’ I will ever get.

Meanwhile, at the Sheraton

Here are some of the new Bangkok hotels I was talking about:

CitiChicInKrungThrepNaKha

CitiChic, somewhere on the way to Bed Supperclub.

Sukhumvit! Nana! Asoke!

S15, at the entrance of Soi 15 on Sukhumvit.
Looks like the Dream is getting some serious competition, and I will have to check one or several of the out to see if they can recreate the same sense of exhilaration I had when I walked in the Dream for the first time (my first digs ever in Bangkok was the rather grotty-looking City Lodge on Soi 19; I also stayed at the Sheraton, but I found Shangri La in Jakarta a much better value for money; although I have yet to find a designer hotel in JKT – perhaps Sparks, but it’s way up in North Jakarta, away from the bule friendly areas; and grandkemang isn’t there quite yet). Note to self: I should try to find found some swanky hotels in Singapore, too.

Chinese brands

What with these Chinese companies? Ok Haier is somewhat Chinese-sounding. But Galanz? Gree? Midea? I can’t imagine a Mandarin speaker twisting his tongue around the ‘z’ and ‘gr’ and ‘ea’. Heck I am not sure how I would pronounce Midea. Sun Hung Kai or Shanghai Tang are perfectly fine names for Overseas Chinese global tycoons brands. So why not stick to something authentic rather than something that doesn’t sound quite ok in any language?

Ads?

Some online ads I see don’t make any sense or are plain weird.

Yes, I can't wait to use this service

 Happy happy!

A naked lady with four legs and no emissions

This is about cars?

Let's have a date with Nosferatu

 Welcome to the Dark Shadows Dating Service.

Tales of future past

That is my kind of place.

How come we didn’t get there?

Urban jungle?

…or just a fun city? I’m blown away by some of the developments in Bangkok. Here, some images from the Zense lounge on top of Central World at Siam Square: 

Zense interior

 The views of Bangkok it affords are nothing short of spectacular:

View of Bangkok from Zense

 

Another view of Bangkok from Zense

Of course, living at the Dream is not bad either:

A bit surprised about Atlanta hotel not allowing tourists to its restaurant unless they stay at the hotel? Especially since I ate there once in the past (based on the recommendation from Lonely Planet; I wonder if they updated their info since). Back then I was not overly impressed with it, but this time the attitude seemed downright rude. While I understand some of their reasons, I think the character behind the Atlanta really needs to relax a bit!

Saint Etienne

My favorite band in my favorite magazine talking about some of my favorite things: Saint Etienne [ in Monocle].