QT – Melbourne’s new hotel
Melbourne has scored a new boutique hotel.
QT Melbourne will be in an 11-storey concrete and stone modernist building on the site of the old Greater Union cinema.
It will have 188 rooms and a floor dedicated to Pascale, the hotel's signature bar and grill.
There is also an open kitchen, glassed-in wine rooms and expansive, luxuriously upholstered lounges.
That’s in addition to a ground-floor café and aperitivo bar called The Cake Shop, a rooftop bar, a Japanese-Korean laneway bar called Hot Sauce. The Cake Shop sells pastries made in an in-house "pastry cube" by Youssef Aderdour, who has been trained by French culinary legends Alaine Ducasse and Joel Robuchon.
And for the foodies who want to do a bit of cooking themselves, it’s right next to a shop in Portland Lane that sells handcrafted Japanese knives.
Pascale's menus are designed by QT creative food director Robert Marchetti. Think modern Euro Bistro with terrines, grilled meat and fish, freshly shucked oysters. It will have a Josper oven and a bespoke charcoal grill.
And the executive chef behind it is Paul Easson, formerly of Melbourne's Rockpool Bar & Grill.
While distinctively Melbourne, the place has been designed by Sydney-based architect Angelo Candalepas. QT's favourite designers, Nic Graham and architect Shelley Indyk have worked on the public spaces and rooms.
The hotel comes with lots of art works. And then there are the rugs created by a local street artists. And the in-room televisions have digital art.
There is a touch of Sydney too. Passersby and guests are greeted by the brand's iconic "Directors of Chaos", just as they are in Sydney. And staff are seductively with outfits by Janet Hime. She’s the one who has designed costumes for many of the major musicals to hit the city in recent years as well as Dame Edna herself.
by Leon Gettler, 5th September 2016