As steel and glass towers and hipster popups increasingly gobble up East London, a new boutique hotel is keeping one foot firmly in the past.
Batty Langley’s is named for 18th-century English garden designer and it and aims to recreate the experience of staying in a genuine Georgian home, right down to period antiques, such as genuine 17th-century carved-oak beds, and a library with 3,500 books.
The front door is kept locked and guests must ring the bell for access – a touch inconvenient, perhaps, but it does contribute to the idea that you’re staying in a lavish home.
Decorated in gorgeous, plush velvets and dark, carved woods – it feels like a reaction to the recent trend of high-design but stark “millennial hotels.” And it works: Batty Langley’s combines the quiet, luxurious dignity of a grand dame hotel with the intimacy of a classic bed and breakfast.
Location, location
Batty Langley’s is ideally positioned to explore the neighbourhood of East London. This hipster ground zero is a fascinating jumble of Georgian architecture and multicultural restaurants (including Jewish and Bangladeshi), and it’s rapidly becoming a tourist destination in its own right. Old Spitalfields Market (look for antiques or dine at its many food stalls), the curry houses of Brick Lane and the juice bars, nose-to-tail restaurants and eclectic boutiques of Shoreditch are all within walking distance of the hotel. Liverpool Street rail station is a five-minute walk away.
Design
Remember how, in elementary school, you visited historic homes with inviting-looking structured velvet couches, plump four-poster beds and roaring fireplaces but you were never able to cross that rope barrier and make yourself at home? Well, now you can. The owners – this is the third property for the preservation-oriented Hazlitt’s group – spent five years in a top-to-tail restoration that joined two 18th-century houses. Batty Langley’s is full of rich textiles and grand oil portraits but the commitment to period accuracy hasn’t overruled modern conveniences. There are concealed high-tech touches everywhere, including high-speed WiFi, power outlets for international plugs, blue-tooth technology, Apple TV and an electric luggage lift in one two-storey suite.
Guests are encouraged to luxuriate in the nook-like public spaces, many with working fireplaces and couches designed for sprawling. The Tapestry room, with glass doors onto a lovely little terrace, has an extensive honesty bar. These are not spaces for mingling but monopolizing while wearing slippers and perhaps nodding off to visions of Downton Abbey.
Eat in or eat out?
Batty Langley’s does not have a restaurant but you can order a room-service breakfast for £11.95 a person. I had fresh Bodum coffee, a generous breadbasket with excellent croissants, jam, rolls and pastries and a small cup of yogurt with a coulis of red fruits. Other options include a bacon sandwich or granola with berries.
If I could change one thing
A Victorian-style throne toilet (where the toilet is embedded in a giant wooden chair) might sound charming, but it’s not. The toilet was so large that my feet didn’t touch the ground.
Whom you’ll meet
In a word? Grownups. This isn’t a draw for the binge-drinking crowd. Expect a well-heeled and discreet mix of business and leisure travellers – when you see anyone at all, that is.
Best amenity
Service is warm and accommodating, and several people offered to make me a cup of tea. The atmosphere is so homey that I felt slightly embarrassed when tipping – like I was shoving a fiver into the hand of a friend who was letting me stay for the night.
Batty Langley’s, 12 Folgate St., London, battylangleys.com; 29 rooms from $610 (£330) a night.
The writer was a guest of the hotel.