Hospitality News Article

Panaz at Hilton Garden Inn Frankfurt Airrail

When Hilton Worldwide unveiled plans to roll out its midscale Hilton Garden Inn brand in Europe, it was clear that the brand, successfully established in the United States for decades, would need to be reengineered to accommodate European design tastes and technical standards.

When it came to developing the furnishing fabrics for the Garden Inn brand, Hilton turned to Panaz, confident in the knowledge that the contract fabric specialists could realise the interior designer’s aesthetic vision with fabrics to meet Hilton’s exacting in-house standards for durability, flame-retardancy and ease of care, as well as European legislative FR requirements; an awareness of purchasing budgets was, of course, another factor to consider. Further confidence was inspired by Panaz’s proven ability to support Hilton’s overseas partners with its multilingual sales team, network of subsidiaries, agents and distributors and long experience of servicing the international hospitality industry.
Working closely with Hilton’s appointed interior designer for the development of the brand, Bevis Design Associates, and with Hilton’s Technical Services team, Panaz developed bespoke contract standard furnishing fabrics in two colour schemes. The two schemes include fabrics for drapes, sheers, upholstered fabric, headboards and scatter cushions. The finalised fabric specifications are issued by Hilton confident in the knowledge that Panaz can offer a high level of service at project level both in the UK and overseas.
The new €660m Frankfurt Airrail development, being developed jointly by IVG Immobilien AG and Fraport AG and scheduled to open in 2010, features the first Hilton Garden Inn in Europe to feature the new brand concept. The 314-room property, , is in a flagship position at one of Europe’s most important transport hubs and as such is a prime location to showcase the new brand concept.
Through it’s German office, Panaz worked with Hamburg-based interior architects JOI Design, who were tasked with project-specific design work such as creation of the public spaces, and through the construction phase continues to work with leading turnkey furnishing contractor, Voglauer GmbH of Austria, who are responsible for the procurement of the thousands of linear metres of fabrics required to fulfil the project.
Said Panaz CEO Tony Attard, “we are proud of our association with Hilton and are privileged to be involved with the new Hilton Garden Inn brand. The Frankfurt Airrail project is testament to our design capability and to the quality of our distribution”.