Among the skills required of hotel designers and architects, there's a budding trait that is becoming increasingly necessary and forces them to tap into a practice outside of their standard curriculum: proficiency with psychology.
No, these professional designers aren't sitting anyone down on a couch and breaking down their feelings, but they're instead analyzing which design choices can elicit positive responses from hotel guests based on the location and expectation of the property.
"We always talk about in the office how much psychology goes into design, and you're like, 'I'm a design professional, I did not think about the fact that I needed to also be a part-time therapist or a psychologist,'" said Molly Forman, interior designer at Washington, D.C.-based boutique design firm //3877.
Picking a target
In order to begin the design process at a hotel, the designers first need to identify the target guest demographic. Different guests will want different things out of a hotel room design, so it's important to settle on a generalized ideal of what the average traveler will be looking for depending on the hotel and location.
Forman's team starts with area research to find out what people typically come to the city for to get a better idea of what guests would be looking for in a hotel room. If the team members are working on a renovation project, they'll comb through online reviews to see what worked and what didn't with the previous design.
"In hospitality, what we're trying to do in the rooms is we're trying to match the guest expectation," Forman said. "Depending on the brand, whatever direction it goes, higher or lower, we want the guests to feel as impressed by the design as they do by the service."
Laura McKoy, creative director and vice president of interior design at Omni Hotels & Resorts, said the company's design team works with the sales and operations team to determine what kind of guest they're targeting.
Planning is a "very in-depth process" that can be as tedious as selecting the best spot in a guest room to put a light switch, said Carrie Nielsen, associate senior project designer at JCJ Architecture. Her team spends time researching trends in the industry as well as guest feedback from previous projects they've worked on. The spaces they create are intended to influence guests' desires and interests, she added.
"Really at the core, [guest psychology] is about understanding how what we're going to create for [guests] will make them feel, make them think, how they'll behave in the space," she said. "It's a necessity in design."
Designers increasingly need to have a better understanding of what makes a guest more inclined to come back to the hotel, said Kona Gray, principal at planning, landscape architecture and urban design company EDSA. A big trend in the hospitality industry is experience-driven travel, so in his design process, Gray tries to make hotel spaces that feel unique and rooted in the location.
"Design is leading the way, and frankly, it's more about psychology than ever before," he said.
How it works
After the intended guest is selected, hotel designers start on a concept that will be tailored to that hypothetical person's needs.
For example, Nielsen said a business traveler might want a desk area in the guestroom to sit down and do work. However, a leisure traveler might want a more spacious room with more seating options instead of a desk.
When Nielsen and JCJ designed The Envoy Hotel, Autograph Collection in Boston's Seaport District, they wanted guests to feel eager to explore the city and not be stuck in their rooms. Bucking conventional wisdom, the hotel's guestrooms face the beds toward the window and use a bike stand in place of a traditional TV stand to echo the theme of enjoying the city further.
"In every capacity, we're constantly trying to be in tune with, 'How are we elevating that experience?'" Nielsen said. "When people come to these hotels, you're also wondering, 'Are they coming to escape? How do you want to be transformed when you come to that space?'"
Forman and her team recently completed a rooms and public space renovation of the Hotel Tonnelle New Orleans, a Tribute Portfolio Hotel. Their research of the property and its area indicated that guests actually crave a quiet environment away from the party scene on Bourbon Street and the French Quarter.
Instead of trying to match the energy of the world outside the hotel, designers created a respite. They chose moodier lighting and did a process called color drenching — when one color is used on the wallpaper, ceiling and furniture — to create a relaxing environment.
"We color-drenched the wall and the ceiling to create this enveloping canopy feel that was a space that guests could relax in, rather than going out and being overly stimulated and then coming back and being overly stimulated," she said.
Lighting and coloring are two huge factors that are influenced by hotel guest psychology. McKoy said designers want to make sure guests feel good when they look at themselves in the mirror in their bathrooms. That's why hotel designers have made an effort to use illuminated mirrors and select a wallpaper color that won't clash with people's skin tones, she said.
"You want to feel like you look great before you go down to your meeting or go to explore the city, and that color that's reflecting in the back of the mirror is just as important," she said.
To give off the feeling of luxury at Omni properties, McKoy's design team wants the windows to appear as large as possible even though they're dealing with finite space, she said. Keeping the excess wall space toward the bottom rather than the top helps give off this feeling.
"Most people look up when they walk into a room and out, not down, so we wouldn't want to cut off that view at the top," McKoy said. "So, let's have those 9 inches of drywall at the bottom [of the wall] instead."
EDSA's hospitality portfolio features luxury properties with grand designs and elegant exteriors. But when it comes to providing the feel of luxury to guests, Gray said one of the most overlooked luxuries is taking the time to become connected to the local culture, environment and one's own self.
This could come in the form of a special swimming spot on the site or having special activities such as stargazing or pottery-making that can connect the hotel guests to the environment. EDSA tries to tie the local culture into the design of each property as well to heighten the guest experience.
"I think people are looking to establish a relationship with a place. They're not necessarily looking for a thread count for their sheets or gold fixtures or any of that stuff anymore. They're looking for a bond," he said.