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Thought minimalist interiors meant maximalist prices? Not so in these design dens. Check in for under £100 a night, and the change will do you good…
3. For wannabe Eastenders:
The Hoxton, London
Street cred can’t help but rub off after a night in London’s gritty-but-gentrfying neighbourhood: the streets of Shoreditch teem with lame leggings and lowrioder bicycles. No wonder owner Sinclair Beecham was keen to distance himself from his last venture: sandwich Pret a Manger. Unlike Shoreditch in general, the Hoxton Hotel doesn’t take itself too seriously. It could charge you a bomb to live the East End Experience-instead you can get a room for just £59. That’s not to say it doesn’t manage trendy-the music in reception veers from Michael Jackson to Interpol and back to Blondie with plenty of irony; the staff dress as though they’ve raided their laundry baskets and left the house in a hurry; and the corridors somehow evoke Prisoner of Cell Block H(blank whitecorridors, acid-yellow lighting). The in-house restaurant, the Hoxton Grille, also aims for hip: a New York bistro-type affair full of Hoxton-heads talking loudly about bars and art galleries; by day, it’s a creative power-lunch haunt, where design folk pow-wow with investors over gammon and pineapple. Overall it wotks. Rooms strike a balance between curl-up comfort and East End design; big beds and clean white-linen blend effortlessly with flatscreens, murals and granite bathrooms. Best of all, there’s plenty of wardrobe space fot thos American Apparel Lycra confections you’ll have picked up on Curtain Road. Wear them to the restaurant and it’ll be like you’ve always lived here.
The Hoxton (02075501000, www.hoxtonhotels.com) has doubles from £59.00, bb
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