Nothing appears to be out of the ordinary in the lobby of this upmarket hotel in the heart of Hong Kong. Suitcase wheels whir over the marble floor, hotel staff sweep open the front door for greet travel-weary guests, and breakfast business meetings are in full swing in the adjoining cafe.
But all is not as it seems at Hotel Icon.
Below ground, in the bowels of the same building, students are filing into a large lecture theatre for the start of the school day at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University's School of Hotel and Tourism Management. Rows of student lockers line the walls, professors stroll through the halls, and a bunch of 20-somethings are sitting around, looking suspiciously like they might be cramming in some last-minute homework.
At Hotel Icon, in Hong Kong's museum district in Tsim Sha Tsui East, the aim is to make these two seemingly divergent worlds collide into an establishment "unlike any other", as the hotel's motto claims. It's a bold experiment, and initially had its detractors.
"A lot of people were skeptical at first, but the model is working," says Richard Hatter, the hotel's general manager, who doubles as an associate professor and teaches two courses at the university downstairs.
While some international tourism and hospitality schools have associations with major chain hotels, Hotel Icon is owned by The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, the only such model in the world. The aim when it was opened in 2011 was to fully integrate a working - and profitable - hotel business with a teaching, learning and research institution. All the hotel's profits are funnelled back into the university, and each year the most promising 100 students from the school catch the lift up to work as trainees alongside the hotel's 360 permanent staff, learning the hospitality trade by interacting with guests.
This doesn't mean the wait staff are going to drop a drink in your lap during dinner, however. During a three-day stay, and despite an eager eye, I couldn't pick out with confidence who among the staff were learning the tricks of the trade. Think of it as the hotel equivalent of Jamie Oliver's Fifteen restaurants, where apprentices serve up a top-notch experience.
And the fact that the hotel is owned by the university means it is not beholden to the whims and demands of a major chain, says Hatter, who worked for two decades with Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts.
His ambition is for Hotel Icon to become a beacon of innovation, in a similar way that Silicon Valley in the San Francisco Bay area of California drove the transformation of the tech industry.
"We use the hotel as a laboratory, and can be experimental with our ideas," he says. "We're shaking up the industry a bit. It's not about making money. It's a hotel with a purpose."
Of course, this ideal of innovation means nothing if the hotel doesn't deliver a pleasurable experience for guests. But it does that, in spades, and in ways that are sometimes unexpected.
Don't be fooled when you walk into your hotel room: that smartphone propped up on the bedside table hasn't been left behind by a forgetful guest. Each of the hotel's 262 rooms is equipped with a 3G smartphone, available for guests to use during their stay in the city. Given a person's smartphone these days is practically an extra appendage, it comes in handy for the international traveller trying to avoid costly roaming fees. You can make free international calls on the phone, and instant access to street maps is valuable when you're out exploring among the neon lights of this frenetic metropolis at night and need to navigate your way to an ATM. There are also Facebook and Instagram shortcuts pre-loaded onto the phone, a city guide, and discounts for those who show the handset at certain stores. The security-conscious will be relieved to see there's an option to wipe all of your data at the end of your stay. It's a useful tool, coming from a someone who two months ago relied on screen grabs taken from Google Maps during a 12-hour stop-over in Vietnam.
The phone project costs Hotel Icon about $1.2 million a year, Hatter says.
Of course, guests who lose or damage the phone may have to fork out $500 fee for the handset.
"I think one kid dropped one in the toilet once, but no, people don't tend to lose them," Hatter says. "Everything we do we try to make relevant to people's lifestyle. We don't put flowers in the room, or chocolates on the pillow. A phone is something that's so valuable to people, that they use all the time."
There are other paybacks, Hatter says. In an age of social media and the constant online sharing of information, the hotel has found its guests are engaging with it online - whether they're sharing a photo of themselves kicking back with a cocktail on the rooftop pool on Instagram, or updating their Facebook status from their harbour-view room. So too, the hotel's TripAdvisor rating has gone up since the phones were introduced earlier this year. Hatter attributes this, in part, to the guests' ability to be constantly connected, should they choose to be. The university staff are studying this phenomenon of online engagement with their guests, and their research is due to be published soon in the Harvard Business Review.
Of course, a phone is not the only reason to draw you to a hotel. The rooms themselves are beautiful, and sleek, many with views of Victoria Harbour and across to the Hong Kong Island side of the city, and with a theme of roundness that stems from the Chinese philosophy of feng shui.
Club members and guests who book suites are, on arrival, ushered upstairs to a separate room for a paperless check-in using an iPad.
The suites have floor-to-ceiling windows that offer a stunning panoramic view of the harbour. Some rooms feature a telescope, so you can zoom in on the iconic Star Ferry chugging through the water, or check out one of the flashing signs on the opposite side of the harbour that have come to symbolise this former colonial outpost. The bathis right next to a floor-to-ceiling window, but bashful guests can lower the blinds for more discretion.
Poke around in the suite for a few minutes and you'll find some nice little quirky touches. The mini bar is free. Eat and drink up, at no extra cost. There's a waterproof television mounted on the wall in the bathroom, should you wish to relax in the bath while eating free snacks.
There's a coffee machine in the suites, an international adaptor in case you've misplaced yours, and a printer with different connections to hook up to your devices. There's even a little map with a running route planned out and a sweat band to combat Hong Kong's often oppressive humidity.
You might need to go for that run after sampling the massive in-hotel buffet, The Market, which has a months-long waiting list for dinner, and caters to just about any gastronomic concoction you could imagine. The more upmarket Above and Beyond restaurant offers Chinese fine dining - think steamed lobster with egg white and black truffle - as well as extensive views across the harbour.
In image-obsessed Hong Kong, where the queues outside Gucci and Prada stores rival those of a busy bus station, there are also some designer touches at the hotel.
Vivienne Tam is a Chinese-born, New York-based graduate of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, who returned to her alma mater to design one of the hotel's suites, which she modelled on her own apartment.
Renowned Hong Kong-designer Barney Cheng designed the hotel staff's uniforms, and a fascinating collection of art is also scattered throughout the building, many by Hong Kong artists.
The university is also casting its mind forward, challenging students to imagine what the hotel room of the future will look like. What will be the next big trend or must-have item that travellers will demand of their accommodation?
The hotel has launched a competition called Tomorrow's Guestrooms, which is open to design students from tertiary education institutions around the world, while professional architects and designers can enter a separate category. The student winner will develop his or her design during a mentoring internship at London design firm Conran and Partners, and the winning rooms will be constructed inside Hotel Icon for guests to book.
While the focus of the hotel is not all about making money, Hatter says it has certainly achieved that. "This is making so much money for the university it's almost embarassing. We're now making profits we were projected to make in year 10 in year three.
"We're preparing people for the industry, but also preparing them to be entrepreneurs, showing them that you don't have to go and work for somebody else, you can come up with your own brand or idea, and that's something that's so powerful."
TRIP NOTES
MORE INFORMATION
hotel-icon.com
discoverhongkong.com
GETTING THERE
Qantas and Cathay Pacific fly direct from Sydney and Melbourne to Hong Kong daily. See qantas.com.au; cathaypacific.com
STAYING THERE
Hotel Icon, 17 Science Museum Road, Tsim Sha Tsui East, Kowloon, Hong Kong, is located in the museum district, and is close to the city's extremely efficient public transport system. A free shuttle bus operates for guests to the centre of the city. Access is easy to the city's major tourist attractions.
Rooms start from $320 a night for two adults. See hotel-icon.com
DINING THERE
There are three dining options on site at the hotel. Green, a ground-floor cafe by day and bar by night; The Market, an extensive buffet with open kitchens and separate sections for deli, sashimi, Hong Kong, Eastern and Western cuisine; and Above and Beyond, a Chinese fine dining restaurant with views over Victoria Harbour.
RATINGS
Our rating 4.5 stars
TripAdvisor 5 stars
The writer travelled as a guest of Hotel Icon.
