Lots of unhappy hotel guests slam budget hotel furniture, or just ugly hotel furniture, by saying it's been store-bought from IKEA. So we're guessing they should probably never visit Vardshuset Hotell and Restaurang, the official IKEA Hotel, located next to the company's headquarters in Almhult, Sweden.
We learned about the existence of the hotel through the New Yorker's recent story on the IKEA culture, when the reporter, Lauren Collins, actually spent a night at the hotel. Here's what she said:
That night I stayed at the IKEA Hotel. Its web site promises, "Guests sleep well and wake up refreshed without art or frills." The lounge area was bright, like a scene from the IKEA catalogue. I sat on a candy-striped KARLSTAD chair and listened to supply managers discuss the respective turn-around times of China and Pakistan in global English. Swedish-speaking men with mustaches wore short-sleeved plaid shirts and drank Eriksberg beer...Later that night, when she went up to her room for bed, there was a "pair of spartan single beds" and on top of the pine desk sat two books--the New Testament and the IKEA catalogue.
Behind the reception desk was a series of candy jars filled with gummi bears and caramels. Why was the receptionist smiling so broadly? were the toasting salesmen bit players in some sort of Almhultian "Truman Show"?
Most reviews are just average with guests saying the rooms are clean and basic if depressing and several said the food is awful. (What, no Swedish meatballs?) Another reviewer described the hotel as "very functional and basic - without annoying flaws" which is probably a step up from that annoyingly flawed nightstand you assembled you in your dorm room way back when.
But for folks with business at IKEA, this is probably the best hotel to stay at. And like IKEA, it's crazy affordable. A single room starts at $125 a night during the week (including the aforementioned terrible breakfast) and only $83 on the weekends.
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