By Johnni Wong | Nov 29, 2010
Tower of efficiency
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| GTower is Malaysia's first Green-rated building. It integrates offices, hotel and club, supported by facilities such as gymnasium as well as food and beverage outlets to provide a more holistic work environment for short-term guests and long-term tenants. |
For a luxury-class business hotel, the GTower Hotel in Kuala Lumpur has gone against conventional ideas about what business travellers would require for their comfort. In this "Green" hotel, you won’t find the superfluous bathtub with overly-thick towels or duvet stuffed with down feathers or a telephone in the bathroom.
What you will find is modern luxury and appropriate features where everything is aimed at meeting the corporate executive’s common - yet often, unfulfilled - desire for convenience and efficiency. The idea is to meet your needs but without imposing a heavy toll on the environment.
It has the fastest Internet upload and download facility in KL, with the option to crank up the speed even further - in your own room - to send loads of pictures to your headquarters in no time at all. This hotel is built to work 24 hours of the day. There is even IT concierge service.
180 rooms
Located in the upscale Kuala Lumpur City Centre neighbourhood, the 180-room hotel soft-opened on March 28. It is scheduled to be launched in the first quarter of 2011. It is owned and operated by Goldis Berhad, which combines the formidable strengths and assets of IGB Corporation Bhd and Tan & Tan Developments Bhd.
The rooms are located from Level 11-13 of the 30-storey twin building with two separate lifts to service guests. There are 157 executive club rooms with a built-up of 36sq m to 38sq m each. There are 22 premier club rooms with a space of 41sq m each. And the only suite has a built-up of 92sq m. Executive club rooms are quoted at the rack rate of RM800+ with the 2011 rate proposed at RM900+. But there is a promotional rate offered before the official launch.
Again, unlike conventional hotels, the check-in counters are at two locations:
- Level 11 front office reception
- Level 28 at The Club
Why not at the ground floor?
Explains Goldis corporate investments head and GTower Sdn Bhd executive director Colin Ng, "We wanted to create a relaxed ambience and personalised check-in experience, hence, we created a poolside check-in at Level 11 and also a club-style check-in at The Club floor.
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| Colin Ng says a luxury-class business hotel these days ought to offer a higher level of efficiency and not be trapped with impractical ideas of operation. |
"Our ground floor main lobby is a high-traffic area, and hence, we would have lost the ‘personalised’ touch, if the hotel check-in were located there."
The hotel’s chief concierge is one of the few "Golden Keys" (Les Clef D’Or) holders in KL. There is a main concierge counter at the building entrance, as well as a guest services counter near the hotel lift lobbies.
This is to ensure that all guests are ushered to their choice of check-in upon arrival at GTower.
GTower Hotel has the following unique selling points:
- First fully-certified "Green" hotel in Malaysia
- Asia’s first all-club rooms hotel. Every room has access to The Club, a 1,080sq m (12,000sq ft) exclusive business networking floor
- Guests are invited for a welcome cocktail and canapés platter in the evenings
- Sustainably-managed, with operations focused on "REDUCING, REUSING, RECYCLE and RETHINK" to minimise any impact on the environment
As a twin-building structure, GTower has been certified "Green" with gold status by Singapore’s Building and Construction Authority (BCA). Says Ng: "We decided to go Green in 2006 and began our certification process in 2007. In March 2008, we received our provisional certification from Green Mark. We were the catalyst building which helped ignite interest in the Green Building concept in Malaysia.
"Malaysia’s Green Building Index (standard) was only launched in 2009."
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| Relaxed and personalised (from left to right): The Club: Green-rated carpeting is used throughout the property; the Bridge Bar; the hotel's front office reception on Level 1. |
No kiddies
GTower is a commercial development, that incorporates offices, hotel and club, supported by facilities such as food and beverage outlets, gymnasium and function rooms.
"We do not have facilities for children under 12," says Ng, "as we designed the hotel specifically for the needs of today’s business travellers. The Club is often used for business meetings, and it would be disruptive to have minors running around."
Besides the usual coffee and tea-making facilities, in-room amenities include:
• 37-inch LCD television screen and a 19-inch LCD television screen in the bathroom
• VGA cable for notebook connection to television screen on request
• Complimentary high-speed wired and wireless Internet access
• Executive work desk
• Internet Protocol Television System
• Internet Protocol Telephony System
• iPod docking station
• Satellite television
• Individually controlled air conditioning
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| From left to right: The connecting Bridge Bar - a cabin-like structure suspended 28 storeys above the ground offers a spectacular view of the city skyline; GTower Hotel's check-in counters are at two locations - on Level 11 and on Level 28; Night view of the hotel's salt-chlorinated pool. |
All hotel guests are accorded full access to The Club and The Bridge Bar which offer a spectacular view of the city skyline. The Club amenities include:
• two private lounges for casual meetings
• three sound-proof boardrooms
• Wi-fi access
• Video on demand IPTV
• High-speed Internet corner
• Business Secretarial support
• Daily breakfast
• Complimentary drinks
• Access to the 2,880sq m (32,000sq ft) Elements fitness centre
• Concierge service
For hotel guests who have a tight schedule, and need to entertain without wasting time looking for a restaurant or bar, the GTower building itself has several F&B outlets, namely:
• Tanzini – Fresh food concept (Level 28)
• Social@KL – restaurant, bar, wine post (ground floor)
• Rakuzen – Japanese cuisine (lower ground)
Green interior
The Axis Identity Group did the hotel interior design with the focus on green and sustainable interior concepts. Highlights include designer furniture such as the Eames chair and Hans Wegner chair and butterfly stool, walnut wood tones and walnut timber flooring and walk-in wardrobe. The 4.3sq m bathroom is finished with Omani marble and is equipped with a luxury rain shower system. The faucets are water-efficiency rated TOTO fittings. Sanitary ware is also from TOTO.
Bedroom lighting is another important feature with Artemide table lamps and Flos ceiling lamp. There are even discrete reading lights on both sides of the bed. And for sleeping comfort, GTower Hotel’s King Coil beds come in the king-size dimensions of 200cm width, 200cm length and 29cm height. And the bedsheets have a thread count of 350.
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| Sustainable interior:Instead of a telephone, you will find a more useful TV screen in the bathroom; GTower Hotel beds are king-size. |
RM1.5mil sculpture
Artwork seen in the hotel include Singapore artists Kumari Nahappan’s five-metre tall Dancing Chillies bronze sculpture in main lobby worth RM1.5mil. There are also commissioned photographs of the rainforest in Borneo by Spanish photographer Maria Espeus who uses a Hasselblad camera and with the prints on baryta paper.
At The Club, local artist Ahmad Fuad Osman’s limited edition photography works are displayed. They depict historical moments in Malaysia’s history with a cheeky image of himself superimposed on them.
While the building’s façade is granite-clad, the lift lobbies and hotel bathrooms feature Omani marble and there’s walnut veneer wood panelling throughout.The paintwork utilises low VOC (volatile organic content) paint, while recycled timber panels are used at The Club floor.
Other flooring material, especially along the corridors and in hotel rooms, include green-rated carpeting throughout the property. The base of the carpet is made from 30% recycled materials, and the top is fully recyclable.
Even the roof-top deck and Bridge Bar deck use re-engineered wood, with 60% of the material from recycled rice husk. Other Green features of the hotel and the GTower building, include:
• hot water for the rooms and swimming pool is not heated with electricity, but waste heat from air-conditioning units
• glass is double- and triple-glazed for minimal heat and sound transmission
• chilled-water air conditioning system has been designed to save up to 28% energy
• energy-efficient lighting is used throughout the building
• energy-efficient lift systems
View other beautiful hotels in Décor & Design section:
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