Hotel Furniture

The breakfast room and the bar, because they are used hardest and they are where failures show up. Those two set the material family for everything else. Lobby and lounge pieces come next, and function-room furniture last, because it is bought on a different logic — storage and resetting rather than appearance.

Outdoor areas are usually under-specified and over-used. If the terrace is a selling point, treat it as a priority room and budget shade and heating with the furniture, from commercial outdoor umbrellas and outdoor heaters.

The frame and the joints. Contract furniture is built so fixings can be reached and tightened, so a seat or a top can be replaced without replacing the piece, and so the whole thing takes being dragged across a floor several times a day. Domestic furniture is built to look right in a room that is used by four people.

The second difference is availability. Contract ranges stay in production longer, so a replacement in two years is more likely to match. That is worth as much as the construction when you are furnishing thirty tables.

Pick one material family and let the finish vary. Timber and upholstery through the public areas, with the lobby softer and the breakfast room wipeable, reads as one hotel. Mixing a timber lounge with a steel breakfast room and a laminate function space reads as three refits.

Keep the tables consistent too, because they are the largest surface a guest sees. One top material across the dining and function rooms, with the shape changing between round cafe tables and square cafe tables, does the job.

Furniture that stacks or folds, and a way to move it. The room earns its money by being reset, so every piece in it should go away quickly — commercial folding tables, stacking chairs, and trolleys from commercial kitchen trolleys to shift them.

Size the storeroom at the same time as the furniture. A function room with nowhere to put the chairs is a function room that never changes layout. If the room also serves food, buffet and table service and catering trolleys are part of the same plan.

Pieces the product page states are rated for outdoor use, in aluminium or treated timber, with cushions that come inside. Indoor upholstered furniture put on a terrace for a season does not come back.

Shade and warmth decide whether the terrace is used at all, so plan them with the furniture rather than after. Tidy the area with outside ashtrays where there is a designated smoking area, and confirm with your local council what is allowed on any public frontage.

Pick the counter height first, then the stool, then check the gap between the two. A stool bought without the counter height in front of you is the most common furniture mistake in a hotel bar. Heights are on each product page in cafe bar stools.

Think about back support as well. Guests sit at a hotel bar for an hour, not five minutes, so a backed stool earns its extra cost. What goes behind the bar is a separate exercise — commercial bar fridges and the rest of the bar line.

Further than you think, because volume orders in contract ranges are made to order rather than picked off a shelf, and a part-delivered dining room cannot open. Lead times are quoted per product line, so ask before you commit to an opening date.

Order the spares in the same batch while you are at it. A hotel replaces individual chairs and tops for years after a refit, and matching later is the expensive part. Tell us the room list and we will give you the lead times together.