In its former iteration, the Hoxton Hotel was the Central Hotel; the landmark redbrick building on the corner of South Great George’s Street and Exchequer Street.
For a certain coterie of Dubliners, who might never have stayed in the hotel itself, its first-floor Library Bar was a long-standing and beloved meeting place. Invisible from the footpath below, by default, the Library Bar was a destination bar. You had to know it was there.
So, it will be good news for many to hear that the Library Bar endures, as does the landmark original wooden staircase that leads up to it, in the refurbished hotel.
The open fire is gone, although the mantelpiece remains, with a gas fire within. The marble-topped bar itself is in the same corner, and there are a number of comfortable armchairs, sofas, chairs and pouffes, seating about 40 people. It remains a lovely, bright, atmospheric space, with the only crime being the books bought by the yard on the shelves. It would be great to see Irish authors represented here instead. Good news: toasties will be on the menu, as will the slightly improbable option of oysters.
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Five years in development, the former Central Hotel is the first Hoxton to open in Ireland. Part of the Ennismore hospitality group, there are Hoxtons in Florence, London, Paris, Amsterdam, New York and Los Angeles, among other locations. At present, there are no plans to open any other hotels in Ireland beyond Dublin. The hoteliers won’t be drawn on the cost of the Dublin enterprise.
On November 20th, its 129 rooms will welcome its first paying customers, served by a staff of 120. Dubliners passing the hoardings that have surrounded the building for the past few years are bound to be curious about what the place looks like now.
An additional floor was added to the top of the building to provide more rooms, and while the Library Bar is still there, there have been many other changes.
Stephan Ernest, the general manager, is showing me around. I ask him to explain the ethos behind the Hoxton brand. “Being in the heart of the neighbourhood,” he says. “We try and give guests authentic experiences of the city they are in.”
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We pass through the kitchen, where a full complement of chefs are at work. With the hotel not yet open, I ask what they are doing. “Testing recipes,” Ernest says. Meanwhile, staff and on-site workers will consume the test results.
The hotel restaurant, Cantina Valentina, is where breakfast will be served for guests. The Peruvian-themed restaurant will be open to the public, as will the semicircular raw bar in the same space, with its sea grass stools. People will be able to watch the prep of their dishes from their seats. “A bit of theatre when you go for dinner,” as Ernest says.
At the opposite part of the room, divided by a partition, there is a bar area, also with a semicircular structure. In all, this space can serve up to 90 covers at a time. Even when empty, and on a wet day, it is a cheery space, the walls filled with esoteric prints, and illuminated with good lighting.
There are two other public spaces on the ground floor. Dollars opens on to South Great George’s Street, and will operate as a cafe and sandwich bar during the day, and a wine bar at night.
The Lobby also opens on to South Great George’s Street. Ernest describes The Lobby as “a modern version of an Irish bar”. There are plenty of outlets for charging phones, and useful hooks under the bar counter to hold bags and jackets. There are also some original coloured glass panes above the doors. All four of the public spaces have distinctively different atmospheres.
The former Rí-Rá nightclub used to be a fabled part of the Central Hotel back in the day. A new nightclub, Groundwork, will open in the Hoxton, either by the end of this year or early next year.
Also on the ground floor is a designated wall space called the Hox Gallery. This will showcase the work of local artists, whose work will be on display for four months at a time. There aren’t any pieces on show when I’m looking around the hotel, but the first artist due to be exhibited here is the Ghanaian-Irish painter William Kwaku Amo.
The reception area has a large glass atrium overhead, which brings in lots of light to an otherwise dim interior space. There’s also a comfortable lobby area, with plenty of couches and armchairs. The entire hotel is bright; a bonus in a country where the weather creates dullness for a good part of the year.
Because the building has had another upper floor added, two flagship adjoining rooms on this level now have large balconies. Step out here and you can see far over the roofs of central Dublin, all the way to the mountains, and be reminded of what a low-level city our capital actually is. These balconies would be great for a summer breakfast, or a sunset cocktail, with the best people-watching opportunities right below.
In a country where pet-friendly hotels are very much in the minority, it’s great to see that the Hoxton’s bedrooms are dog-friendly, even the smallest ones. The bedrooms range from the smallest, the Snug, at 14sq m, to the Biggy, at 48sq m.
The bedrooms all share muted palettes of green, blue, and fawn, apparently inspired by “Ireland’s autumnal landscapes”. The bathrooms have lovely grey-blue glass tiles, art-deco-style curved mirrors, and vintage-style washbasins. In the bedrooms, there are padded fabric headboards in various geometric patterns in fawn and cream. Ennismore’s in-house interior designers, Aime Studios, did the design.
Old-style Roberts radios are on bedside nightstands. The floors are a type of parquet, and the windows are composed of noise-cancelling glass, which will benefit lighter sleepers as the hotel is right in the middle of one of the noisiest and busiest parts of Dublin.
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All the rooms, except the smallest ones, the Snug rooms, have desks at which to work. Some have ottoman benches at the end of the bed. Some have large rugs. The larger rooms have sofas, fringed armchairs and separate sitting areas. Everything is unfussy and quietly stylish. There are hooks outside doors, from where breakfast bags can be collected.
So how much does it cost to spend a night there? Obviously, it will depend of the size of the room you book, and the time of the week, but the hotel has a 20 per cent off opening offer.
At time of writing, midweek rates for the smallest room, the Snug, in mid-March start at €204, with rates for a Roomy room (21sq m) from €259.
Three to try at the Hoxton
Peruvian braised lamb in Cantina Valentina
Slow cooked Slane Valley lamb, coriander sauce, black kale, frijoles (€38)
The Hustler sandwich in Dollars
Dillisk seaweed chicken salad, bacon, lettuce, heirloom tomato (€14)
Coconut spritz cocktail in Cantina Valentina
Coconut pisco, toasted coconut, Aperol, Lillet Rose, prosecco, Fever-Tree soda, grapefruit (€15)
