“Discreetly tucked away off Berkeley Square, the luxury four star deluxe Chesterfield Mayfair Hotel in London is where the traditional virtues for which Mayfair is a byword meet the ultimate in contemporary convenience, and the perfect location in London for those who value a style of quality that never goes out of fashion.”
This one sentence of ad copy captures the essence of the Chesterfield Mayfair. The way it runs on. The way it uses three words per concept rather than one. The way it leans on the cachet of “Mayfair” as hard as it can. The unembarrassed but vague superlatives. The smugness.
Never have I stayed in a hotel so undeservedly conscious of its own superiority. Our double was tiny, cramped, and stuffily decorated. The receptionist was plainly bored to be dealing with someone as pedestrian as a customer. Our teapot did not work, and the man sent up to fix it seemed faintly put out by the whole affair. The breakfast options were all so staggeringly expensive and so bizarre that we wandered off to a nearby cafe instead, even though it was raining hard at the time. The hotel is certainly in a good location, and it unquestionably has decent amenities on offer, but its whole mode of operation is suggests that it is doing the guests a favor by allowing them to stay, rather than that it means to provide for their comfort and convenience.
I suppose this may appeal to some people. If you enjoy a submissive relationship with a hostelry; if you fancy a touch of the dominatrix in your receptionist; if you like to be condescended to, and to feel that you are staying someplace above your touch, and that you’ve gotten away with something by managing to pass through the door at all, then the Chesterfield Mayfair may be for you. I had the distinct impression that people of the class to which the Chesterfield pretends would know better than to stay in a place like this.
The most spectacular bit of nonsense is the ashtrays. Ashtrays at the Chesterfield Mayfair have their sand impressed with the silhouette of a carnation, because the Chesterfield, you see, is part of the Red Carnation hotel group.
There are touches that read as attention to detail, and there are touches that are purely fatuous. And that one falls in the latter category.
