1. Who are you?

2. What do you like about what you do?
I am a people‘s person and my position allows me to meet daily employees and guests alike. The advantage of working for a boutique Hotel is that you can connect to a deeper level with your guests, eventually becoming friends with them after a while.

3. What don’t you like about what you do?
To be glued in my office doing administration work.

4. Please tell us about your hotel and your aims with it?
Le Gray is a contemporary luxury hotel which just opened few months and has been awaited for quite some time by the local market. It clashes with the vision people have of a typical hotel in the region which normally has red carpet, heavy draped windows, gold lighting fixtures, etc. We are an unpretentious hotel bringing a new look to what is commonly seen, a great design yet very functional, aimed at one goal only, the guest experience. We are a bowl of fresh air for everyone staying with us.

5. Are you working with blogs and if yes, what is your favourite blog?
No.

6. Your TOP 3 hotel experiences and why?
Four Seasons in Bali. You have your own personal butler and pool in your villa beside a white sand beach stretching for few kilometres. The place is secluded; the service is discreet yet attentive.

7. Your TOP 3 food/restaurant experiences and why?
Mezzanine at Grand Hyatt Singapore, different types of food offered under the same roof. Regardless where you sit I can have my foie gras while my guest is indulging in sashimi all served at the same time.

8. Can you offer our blog visitors 3 things they absolutely need to do/visit/see when visiting your city?
The city of Byblos, a winery tour as Lebanon offers excellent wines, and our famous Shawarma chicken or beef.

1. Who are you?

2. What do you like about what you do?
I like to see our guests enjoy their stay with us and realise they’ve had a wonderful experience in our city.

3. What don’t you like about what you do?
I don’t like the low season, but rejecting guests when we are completely booked is even worse.

4. Please tell us about your hotel and your aims with it?
We are a small family run four star hotel on an excellent and romantic location, on a peaceful square, yet in the heart of the old town, amid shops and restaurants, bars and pubs. Majority of the historic sites and musea are in the neighbourhood of our hotel. Our building dates back to the 17 century so our decoration and styling is baroque, but with a touch of modern colours. Our rooms are all nicely furnished and mostly oversized. We like to offer our guests a personal treatment and an experience of a domestic yet stylish environment so they can enjoy discovering the city or their stay with us, regardless of their purposes for visiting Ljubljana.

5. Are you working with blogs and if yes, what is your favourite blog?
No, I am not. I’m just an occasional reader of blogs.

6. Your TOP 3 hotel experiences
- One&Only, Royal Mirage, Dubai, UAE
- Huis ter Duin, Noordwijk, NL
- Punta Tragara, Capri, I

7. Your TOP 3 destination experiences
- Italy
- The UAE
- Switzerland

8. Your TOP 3 food and/or beverage experiences
- Restaurants on the Emerald Princess, Princess Cruises
- Carlton, St. Moritz
- Meneghello, Palmizana island, Croatia

9. Can you offer possible readers 3 things they absolutely need to do/visit/see when visiting your city?
- Sleep at Antiq Hotel
- Visit the old town and the marketplace, possibly also the flee market on Sunday
- Have dinner at the As restaurant

10. Any comments you want to share with us?
I’d like to thank the Ring Hotel for giving us the opportunity to present ourselves and connect us in this way. I think it’s a marvellous idea. I wish you a lot of success and I’ll most certainly visit the Ring Hotel, when I come to Vienna, it looks as a very nice hotel from the photos on your website.

1. Who are you?

2. What do you like about what you do?
My job is a way of life! I love the challenging elements of my day to day, the sense of satisfaction that one gets from delivering seamless service to our guests and attaining our targets. I would not want to do anything else.

3. What don’t you like about what you do?
I would describe myself as a workaholic and unfortunately my job indulges that side of my personality.

4. Please tell us about your hotel and your aims with it?
The Scotsman is a bit of an institution in Edinburgh.  The building dates back to 1901 and was the residence of the Scotsman Newspaper until 2001 when it was converted into the Scotsman Hotel. The Scotsman is a unique combination of hotel, award winning Brasserie, Health Club and Spa, each part a distinctive and exclusive venture offering modern service with classic values.

The Glasshouse opened in June 2003 and has quickly established itself as the leading boutique Hotel in the city.  Behind the façade of the 150 year old Lady Glenorchy church, you’ll find the clean, modern lines of The Glasshouse.  Boasting the largest roof garden in Europe and floor to celing windows in all bedrooms, The Glasshouse offers a unique experience in terms of design, decor and service.

We constantly aim to achieve high standards of care in the service that we provide to our guests and to deliver our targets to the board of directors.

5. Are you working with blogs and if yes, what is your favourite blog?
Our PR and marketing is handled by our head office so I don’t really have the opportunity to put my blogging skills to the test.

6. Your TOP 3 hotel experiences
That is easy! Threadneedles Hotel (London), Inverlochy Castle (Highlands), Park Hyatt (Tokyo)

7. Your TOP 3 destination experiences
Tokyo, Washington DC, Zurich

8. Your TOP 3 food and/or beverage experiences
The Ivy (London), Andrew Fairlie (Perthshire) and The Kitchin (Edinburgh)

9. Can you offer possible readers 3 things they absolutely need to do/visit/see when visiting your city?
Stay at the Scotsman or the Glasshouse, visit Edinburgh Castle and have a wee dram of whisky at the North Bridge Brasserie Bar!

10. Any comments you want to share with us?
Enjoy each day.

1. Who are you?
Enzo IACONIS General Manager of the Hotel de Vigny, a charming Boutique Hotel of 27 rooms & 11 suites just off the Champs Elysées in Paris- Member of the “Relais & Châteaux” Association.

2. What do you like about what you do?
Creativity, availability to listen, meet guests and make them feel at home – Make sure they are always satisfied during their stay and become regular guests – anticipate their requirements – that’s where dedicated team work plays an important key role.
Travelling throughout the world to find potential guests and extending the business.

3. What don’t you like about what you do?

• When we cannot satisfy a specific guest’s requirement,
• That I cannot always be personally available at all times with my staff to attend all the Hotel operations,
• When we cannot take a booking at the restaurant because it is full.

4. Please tell us about your hotel and your aims with it?
The Hotel de Vigny is a Luxury Boutique Hotel centrally located off the Champs Elysées & the most prestigious monuments in the heart of the 8th District. Our aim is an incentive to constantly improve the quality and standards of the hotel to satisfy guests’ requirements – also to promote the Baretto Restaurant which is very popular amongst politicians, business people or show biz who appreciate meeting in a discreet and cosy Art Deco Atmosphere and enjoy Chef Patrick Marteau’s both inventive and traditional food. Promote the musical evenings enchanting guests with the harpist’s magical music. In a word make the Hotel de Vigny: the Relais & Châteaux Hotel to stay in Paris.

5. Are you working with blogs and if yes, what is your favourite blog?
Not at the moment.

6. Your TOP 3 hotel experiences:
Le Plaza Athenee (Paris), The Milestones Hotel (London) and La Posta Vecchia (Italia)

7. Your TOP 3 destination experiences:
New York, Saint Petersburg, Venice

8. Your TOP 3 food and/or beverage experiences:
in Paris: Apicius, Arpege, Hotel Meurice Restaurant, Ducasse Restaurant at the Plaza Athenee

9. Can you offer possible readers 3 things they absolutely need to do/visit/see when visiting your city?
Eiffel Tower, Montmartre – Museums: Louvre, Orsay, Museum of Modern Art, Pompidou Art Galleries, Antique Dealers – exhibitions

10. Any comments you want to share with us?
The Relais & Châteaux is a Worldwide Association but each hotel is unique

The Hôtel de Vigny is part of the prestigious ‘Relais & Chateaux’ chain. It is located in the elegant 8th district of Paris just 50 meters away from the Champs-Elysées and the Arc de Triomphe.

1. Who are you?

2. What do you like about what you do?
Meeting new customers and providers everyday is the most thrilling part of my job. Enjoying people from all over the world, with different culture, personal history and occupations. It is really enriching as you have to greet them according to their own traditions, yet they all have to be satisfied and ensure to make them come back.

3. What don’t you like about what you do?
That I am not able to meet all the clients, even though our team is dedicated to make their stay the most enjoyable one, I would like to see them all.

4. Please tell us about your hotel and your aims with it?
Hotel BALZAC is a unique property, mixing the traditional decor with contemporary fabrics along with a gourmet restaurant, rated 3-star at Michelin Guide. A stay at the Balzac is a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
My goal for the Balzac? Make it one of the best hotels in Paris, reaching the top 20 in 2010. We can make it.

5. Are you working with blogs and if yes, what is your favourite blog?
Not that much actually except my friends’ ones.
I truly think this is a great medium and I will create one for the Balzac for sure.

6. Your TOP 3 hotel experiences:
Oriental in Bangkok; tradition and excellence
Montage in Laguna Beach : the best Californian experience ever
Eden Roc on French Riviera: perfection in service and view on the Mediterranean sea

7. Your TOP 3 destination experiences:
Provence, as everything there seemed to have been especially created for hapiness
sia, especially Thaïland for its culture and the kindness of its people
California:  from San Francisco to Los Angeles, the true American dream

8. Your TOP 3 food and/or beverage experiences:
- Restaurant Pierre GAGNAIRE, inside the Hotel, one of the 3 best restaurant in the world
- Mon Vieil Ami, gourmet bistrot in the heart of Ile Saint-Louis in Paris
- Rosticceria Fiorentina in Roma : genuine, simple, perfect

9. Can you offer possible readers 3 things they absolutely need to do/visit/see when visiting your city?
- Champs Elysées
- Ile Saint-Louis
- Trocadéro Gardens

10. Any comments you want to share with us?
Life is short, enjoy every minute of it.

At the top of the Champs-Elysées, this 19th-century elegant mansion is one of the most exceptional landmarks in Paris.

1. Tell us about yourself?

2. Tell us about your daily life at work and what you like about it?
Everything, the Staff, the Guests, Every day is different. Working with other Passionate Individuals to create a high quality environment.

3. Tell us about your daily life at work and what you don’t like about it?
Not much. I am a pretty positive guy and my glass is always half Full, not half Empty!!!
I can sometimes get frustrated but that just steers me on to do even better! Life is too Short not to make the most of it!

4. Tell us about your hotel and your aims with it?
It dates back to 1856 when it opened as The Bank of The City of London. The lobby is dominated by a stunning stained glass dome, offers 69 bedrooms, 3 meeting rooms, Bonds Bar caters for up to 100 people and Bonds restaurant has 80 covers offering modern French cuisine.

5. Are you working with blogs and if yes, what is your favourite blog?
No but my son is watching Youtube, which makes me feel old.

6. Your top 3 hotel experiences?
Good Question. Glasshouse Hotel (Edinburgh), Hotel de Paris (Monte Carlo) and Le Bristol (Paris)

7. Your top 3 destination experiences?
Singapore, Bali and Hong Kong

8. Your top 3 food and/or beverage experiences?
Good Question …

9. Can you offer possible readers 3 things they absolutely need to do/visit/see when visiting your city?
Stay at Threadneedles, drink Champagne in Bonds Bar, and eat in Bonds Restaurant.

10. Any comments you want to share with us?
Be nice to people and they will be nice with you!

Threadneedles, Luxury Boutique Hotel in London. Voted by Conde Nast Traveller as one of the top 50 hotels in the world.

Roger Crisp from the Good Motoring Magazine checks in to  The Ring Hotel.