REVIEW: Inside Manchester’s newest budget hotel Motel One

With prices from £69 for single occupancy, you could be forgiven if the price or the word motel made you think that Motel One would be more like a budget hotel than a design-led hotel – but that couldn’t be further from the truth, says Dennis Keighron-Foster.

Motel One’s basic premise is that they ‘combine affordability and design to give a feeling of luxury.’

“For a no frills
hotel the service
they provide is
pretty frilly.”

‘We want our guests, particularly business ones, who might not get to spend time in Manchester, to know where they are,’ says operations director, Daniel Müller. And they have certainly done that.

The building has been cleverly designed so that the hallway windows frame a beautiful view of Manchester, but it’s more what they have done inside that matters – symbols of Manchester are incorporated into the design without becoming a pastiche of itself. Worker bees on the wallpaper and hive patterns on the foyer furniture give a gentle nod towards our industrious past, yet fit the hotel’s contemporary, clean and modern look.

In the bar the decor takes a Britpop turn, with walls lined with metal-coated LPs as a nod to our illustrious musical heritage and a ceiling adorned with a mirror ball. The lounge and bar scream fun and have a really relaxed atmosphere. But this is a lovely bonus – we don’t go to a hotel for its bar. Luckily, I got the opportunity to stop over and sample one of its rooms and breakfasts first hand.

My room was compact but quite well thought out and the bathroom was far superior to anything else in this price range. With marble floors and sink unit, you definitely don’t feel like you are in a budget hotel.

The absence of a second bedside table was a bit irritating, having to put your glass of water on the floor of a tight room seems like a bit of a lapse of judgement when it comes to the design, but this is a minor detail.

Another drawback for me was that although the linen was of high quality, the bedding was a bit too synthetic and the mattress was quite hard – although much preferable to an overly soft one. Despite this, I did sleep well.

The breakfast was, as expected, an extremely welcome self-serve continental one. They went above and beyond the sort of offering I would expect at this price, with pastries, cold meats, hard and soft boiled eggs, good quality coffee and everything else you’d expect and more.

For a no frills hotel, I’d say that the service they provide in the environment they have created is pretty frilly. I would heartily recommend Motel One, particularly to business travellers who might be travelling alone, as its proximity to the station is ideal. It has a good bar to meet up in for a few drinks, and its lounge is big enough to have a private meeting in, too. Add this to a very generous breakfast and comfortable rooms, and it’s an absolute bargain at £69.

Contact & book

34 London Rd, Manchester M1 2PF

0161 200 5650

www.motel-one.com/en/hotels/manchester

@MotelOne