JETSETREPORT

Le Gray

Campbell Gray does luxury design hotel in Beirut

Hours 24
Phone (961) 1 971 111
www.legray.com

Martyr s Square Beirut Central Business District Lebanon

hotels

Who's Going

The Hiltons, Media Elite, Fashion Editors

Reason to Stay

Rooftop Pool, Design Hotel, Gourmet Eatery, Hip Clientele

Hotel Type

Luxury Design Hotel

When British taste-maker Campell Gray (One Aldwych, Carlisle Bay) chose Beirut as the site of Le Gray, his first new hotel in almost a decade, the travel world took note. While mired in the perpetual civil war that lasted a generation and made the city's name synonymous with urban war, the new Beirut seems bridged in to a gilded past with a visual French accent. Le Gray's location is on Martyr's Square in the heart of Beirut's ever-hot Solidere waterfront where locals strut catwalk beach fashions and tourists gorge themselves on minced lamb tarts and flatbreads before returning to the hotel's Haussmann-inspired façade.
 
A sparse lobby of gleaming white floors juxtaposed with black leather wall behind a desk-style reception is dotted with modern artwork from Gray's personal collection. The sparseness of the first floor neutralizes the senses enough to truly take-in the visual grandeur of a circular rooftop lounge aptly named Bar Three-Sixty for its 360-degree view of the Mediterranean and looming snowcapped Mt. Lebanon.  A rooftop pool that's one of the chicest in Beirut is more spa than disco with its infinity glass edge that juts into the skyline next to an indoor/outdoor terrace café.

The Room

Beirut is in the midst of a hotel boom with the Four Seasons and Le Gray opening within a few months of each and bringing with them some 500 luxury level accommodations to a city that is destined to recapture its title of Paris of the Middle East. Le Gray captures the essence of Campbell minimally chic design aesthetic with rooms that lean on the conservative side, as with most Gray properties, with too-neutral color palette and sparse styling that is more about service, views and location that cutting-edge design. The hotel fits boutique travelers looking for a luxury edge popular with media and fashion travelers in lieu of the more business minded Four Seasons that caters to more of a financial crowd.

Preferred Room

City View Suite

Special Features

Rooftop Pool, Art Collection, Hip Clientele, Rooftop Lounge

Amenities

Restaurant, Spa, Lounge, Bar, Pool, Cafe

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