Entrance to Noku Kyoto
ROXY-PACIFIC Holdings, which owns the 500-room Grand Mercure Roxy Hotel Singapore, is expanding beyond the Lion City with its own upscale boutique brand, Noku Roxy, which has one hotel in operation in Kyoto and two others that are being developed in Phuket and the Maldives.
After opening the first Noku Roxy in Kyoto recently, the Singapore homegrown public-listed property and hospitality group has acquired 10 villas and additional land in Phuket which it will redevelop as a Noku Roxy hotel with 90 rooms and five villas, for completion in 2018.
In the Maldives, its designers are re-working an existing property with 50 villas, 45 minutes away from Male, into another Noku Roxy.
The brand is the brainchild of Roxy-Pacific’s executive director and managing director Chris Teo, whose stints with Amanresorts and Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group before helming Roxy-Pacific’s hotel ownership business helped shape his vision for a brand that could offer deep local insights and personalised service but at affordable prices.
To do that, Teo keeps Noku Roxy hotels small in roomcount, in strategic locations, with artisanal yet modern design and offering personal recommendations on the hidden gems of the place. Noku Kyoto, for example, has only 81 rooms, with handpicked art unique to each room, is located directly across the Kyoto Imperial Palace and has its own map of the Kyoto city centre that recommends favourite local haunts and restaurants, access into exclusive artisanal houses and the best sightseeing spots, many of which Teo has himself tried and tested. Guests can also reserve personalised walking tours with in-house guides, and receive itineraries or day-trip recommendations from Noku Kyoto’s staff.
Rates start from 20,000 yen (US$194.4).
Teo: bringing ‘the local experience’ back to hotels
“I always have in mind the upper-scale four-star boutique hotels as I believe there is still a lot of room in Asia for a product that offers the local character and personalised service, but at non-luxury prices,” said Teo.
A true believer of giving guests the authentic local experience, Teo said: “As a hotel, we have to be responsible and respectful of local cultures and traditions. Sometimes we lose the plot; we are so high-tech and connected all the time that we lose touch of people. In Asia especially, everyone and everything is so fast-paced.
“So we want to try and bring back the local experience. Why do you think Airbnb is booming? They do connect tourists to the place and create local experiences.”
Teo said independent hotels had more room than chains to be authentic. “The big chains have better scale and efficiencies, but the independents, being smaller, are in touch with the local environment, can make quicker decisions and are more nimble,” he said. “As a company we are not that big but we know our staff, our suppliers and we build relationships and look at things in a more in-depth fashion.”
On further expansion, he said he was always on the look-out for the right projects. It took him four years, for example, to clinch Noku Kyoto, a gem of a deal he said because of its location across the Kyoto Imperial Palace and next to Marutamachi subway station, its opening at a time Japan tourism is booming and its manageable size, being the first hotel venture outside Singapore for Roxy-Pacific.
“In selecting where to invest, I look first at the destination, as I believe people travel not to stay in a hotel unless it is a destination hotel, but to experience a place.
“Next comes the software – the people, how you run the hotel and what value add you bring. Today, you can create an authentic hardware anywhere as you can bring in the materials and hire great craftsmen, but at the end of the day it’s trained people who will make the difference,” said Teo.
