Hotels, Venues & Event news
Accor Hotels has signed a management agreement to rebrand the Portland Hotel, Manchester. The hotel is currently trading as The Portland Hotel and will re-open as the Ibis Styles Manchester Portland Street in the summer of 2016, following an investment of £3m transform it to the Ibis Styles.
The hotel previously was part of The Hotel Collection and has 9 meeting rooms and 204 bedrooms.
The King Street Townhouse, which is situated on Booth Street in Manchester, has now opened. The hotel has 40 bedrooms and suites, a Tavern bar and restaurant and a rooftop spa pool. There are no meeting rooms but there is a south facing Roof Garden which is used as Event Space and can take up to 150 people.
This is the Eclectic Hotel Group’s fourth property, which also includes Great John Street Hotel, Didsbury House Hotel and Eleven Didsbury Park Hotel, which are all in Manchester.
IHG has added the Holiday Inn Sittingbourne to its group. The hotel was previously a Best Western property and has recently undergone a full refurbishment.
It is situated in the centre of Sittingbourne, on the north Kent coast and has 79 bedrooms. There are six meeting rooms including a traditional ballroom which has capacity for up to 250 delegates in theatre style or 170 for a dinner.
Every year the World Capital Institute recognizes the world’s best centres of knowledge with the “Most Admired Knowledge Cities Award”. In 2015 Vienna took first place in the category “Knowledge City Region”. The city’s educational establishments, its cultural offering, its high quality of life, its cosmopolitanism and central geopolitical location were the decisive factors for Vienna’s “pole position”, which is also of central importance in the competition for international meetings.
Commenting on Vienna’s victory as a “knowledge city”, Christian Mutschlechner, Director of the Vienna Convention Bureau, said: “Once again, Vienna has stood out as a university city with the highest number of students in the German-speaking region and as an internationally sought-after centre of knowledge.” Ever since the year 2007, the World Capital Institute based in Monterrey in Mexico singles out cities that stand out from their competitors in the generation and management of knowledge for the “Most Admired Knowledge Cities Award 2015”. Vienna was nominated this year for the first time, winning out against Copenhagen in second place.
Vienna has also achieved success by means of its social capital, internationality and financial resources, its geopolitical position between East and West, its environmental awareness, and due to its transport and telecommunications systems. However, Vienna’s top ranking was also thanks to factors such as equality of opportunity, a functional health system and not least its innovation and knowledge-based services. Besides, the strategy of “Innovative Vienna 2020” – approved by Vienna City Council in September 2015 – has as its objective the continued promotion of the city’s innovative potential.