REARDON SMITH APPOINTED BY VISOR INVESTMENT SOLUTIONS TO DESIGN FIRST FIVE-STAR HOTEL IN BELARUS

ReardonSmith Architects has recently been appointed by Kazakhstan-based Visor Investment Solutions to design a new Hyatt Regency in Minsk. It is set to be the first five-star hotel in the country of Belarus.

The site comprises a green swathe of land, complete with orchards, overlooking Minsk's largest lake. Yet it is located close to the city centre, adjacent to an arterial road and main tramline. ReardonSmith's concept is to harness the beauty of the natural environment on one side, while managing the relationship with the city on the other by means of bold, unadorned architectural styling in keeping with much of Minsk.

According to Patrick Reardon, Executive Chairman of ReardonSmith, the original inspiration for the design of the building was a piece of quartz crystal. He said the opportunity of creating a hotel on the Komsomolskoye Lake as "like designing a hotel on the banks of the Serpentine."

From the road, the view is of a 'closed', low-rise building finished in masonry and only glimpsed through a screen of full-height masonry columns. Moving into the site, however, the story becomes one of glass and crystal with a curved glass canopy soaring over the entire building, together with a rear elevation, almost totally in glass, opening the hotel up to the view and catching the moving reflections of the lake beyond.

The first section of the canopy creates a porte-cochere before meeting the building at the fifth floor Club Lounge level. The architecture will also incorporate the existing orchards within the envelope of the building. The hotel will have in the region of 240 guestrooms, a spa, swimming pool and a nightclub as well as restaurants, bars and lounges. Work on site is expected to being towards the end of 2007. The Hyatt Regency Minsk is just one of a host of openings Hyatt Hotels & Resorts has scheduled over the next three years throughout Eastern Europe and Asia.

Its key European opening will be the launch of the Hyatt Regency in Kiev later this year. In May 2007, the group is also set to premier its new 'on' brand, with the launch of Hyatt on the Bund in Shanghai.

This is just one of nine new Hyatt hotels currently under development in China. Park Hyatt are due to open properties in Beijing, Ningbo and Shanghai between now and 2009. Hyatt Regency is opening hotels in Chengdu, Chongqing, Jing Jin City, Nanjing and Tianjin. The Grand Hyatt brand is set to make its mark in Guangzhou, Macau and Shenzen. Elsewhere, other Hyatt Hotels scheduled to open this year include the Park Hyatt Istanbul and the Hyatt Regency Phuket.

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From SLEEPER

Publication Date: March 2007

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