The black-and-white framed photograph of David Bowie by my bedside got me at first sight. Next to it was a note that said, “We are big fans of David Bowie too … Hope you’ll enjoy one of our favourite quotes from the man. Life is not meant to be just black or white, we are constantly pushing and loving the greys.”
A personalised welcome … from David Bowie
Obviously, the Old Clare Hotel Sydney team had been reading my social media posts and articles about the late artiste and wanted to give me a personalised welcome. I was pretty impressed by the effort and thought.
“Do you do it for everyone?” I asked general manager Timo Bures. My friends had teased me that they probably only do it for travel journalists like me.
“We do it for everyone we can,” he said.
The idea, he said, is to make a personal connection with guests by learning about them through social media and picking something that will resonate with them. “People are sharing things because they want the world to know about them – whether they like David Bowie, or wine, whatever that may be – and if we can use it to make you feel more welcomed and embraced, why not?
“Yes, some might feel it creepy but we ask ourselves, how can we take that factor away, so we communicate it subtly.”
Bures said the idea came during a Mercedes Benz event in the hotel and the team learnt the CEO’s first car was a blue Volkswagen Beetle and so on check-in, he found a toy car of that make and colour. “He absolutely fell in love with it.”
It’s these little things that Bures feels make the Old Clare Hotel unique. That, plus its design touches, and the history of the property of course.
Colourful foyer: One of the things that make the The Old Clare Hotel unique.
Part of the Singapore-based Unlisted Collection of Hotels, the hotel, the reincarnation of the Carlton Brewery headquarters, took owner Loh Lik Peng four years to restore and convert into a 62-room property with two restaurants (Kensingston Street Social and Automata) and two bars, one of which is the historic Old Clare Bar.
Since it opened last September, the Old Clare has been raved about and its restaurants winning awards and garnering rave reviews so much so that even Bures has been taken aback by how fast it’s taken off.
The historic Old Clare Bar
Describing himself as a hotelier “with traditional German hospitality education” – he started with “white gloves and flambes” – Bures, who moved to Australia 11 years ago, said, “We hit the ground running, faster than we expected. We must have struck a nerve. Sydney is a very competitive but bland hotel market – unlike Berlin, London or New York, it doesn’t have a lot of interesting hotels.
Timo Bures: “The Old Clare is a great place to hang out.”
“Our opening in a new part of town was a bit of a novelty. Not every tourist to Sydney would come here but people are finding out it’s a great place to hang out.”
What has also surprised him has been the broader than expected appeal of the hotel. “We had expected people from 20 to 45 years old but we are getting customers of all age groups, up to 60s. We had also expected corporate clients from the IT and new media companies, of course, but we are also getting corporate customers from traditional industries like banks and insurance.”
Quirky design elements are everywhere in the hotel – from the industrial-looking lamp on the desk in my Chippendale Loft to barber chairs, part of Loh’s signature in his hotels. A touch of irreverence also works in the Sydney context with bags that say “Dirty Laundry” and “Random Crap”.
A bagful of dirty laundry
It’s been running in the mid-80s since it opened with average rate of under A$300. Close to 65% of its business is domestic. The Singapore market is strong, due to its Unlisted Collection ties.
It also helps that the hotel is in the middle of a A$2-billion mixed-use urban village called Central Park that you could mistake for a mini-version of Singapore and modern Asia, with its range of eateries.
Developed by Sydney-based developer and real estate company Greencliff Holdings, whose executive chairman, Dr Stanley Quek, is a Singaporean, the area has lots of great eateries with an Asian twist. There’s Spice Alley, a take on the Singapore food court, with local favourites ranging from chicken rice, roti prata and curry to laksa.
You can find Malaysian, Vietnamese, Thai, Indian and Chinese food in the vicinity. Koi Dessert Bar, opened by Masterchef 2015 Reynold Poernomo, draws crowds not just for a chance to taste the desserts but to meet the young celebrity chef.
Said Bures, “Our hotel, our restaurants, this precinct – they are made for social media. There are so many stories connected to them. At the Old Clare Bar, which is a historic institution, people come up and say, we used to drink here. Once, we had a guest who said he had installed the telephone system and heard Paul Kelly sing at the bar.”
Spice Alley – Singapore styled food court
Not everything has been smooth sailing of course. The biggest challenge has been getting the message across to its team of 138 staff to be different. “We want to free them from traditional thinking and offer guests a different kind of experience. This is why we have hired from other industries. We were careful in the wording of our recruitment ads, like not saying, prior experience required, and we didn’t advertise on hotel sites.”
While I was talking to Bures, a phrase I heard at the Hotelsworld conference in Sydney that week ran through my mind.
Tony Ryan, managing director, global mergers and acquisitions, hotels & hospitality group of Jones Lang LaSalle Property Consultant, had said on a panel when interviewing the CEO of Frasers Hospitality Group, Choe Peng Sum, “we all know a hotel with under 100 rooms and lots of restaurants will not work”.
Timo Bures: “The way of the future is toward individualised, specialised experiences.”
Ryan was being deliberately provocative, referring to Frasers’ rather unexpected acquisition of two of UK’s leading boutique lifestyle hotel brands, Malmaison and Hotel du Vin for £363m last year. Choe said that was the conventional wisdom and that times had changed. Travellers were looking for alternative accommodation experiences and hospitality companies had to adapt.
Said Bures, “The industry is changing, customers are changing. Airbnb has proved that. No one has won trying to fight the Internet. The way of the future is toward individualised, specialised experiences.”
• All images credit: The Old Clare Hotel & Yeoh Siew Hoon
