The Oblique Joys of Barcelona (Hotel Silken Diagonal (Barcelona))

Member Name: The Daz

Product:	Hotel Silken Diagonal (Barcelona)
Date:	21/10/08 (191 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Trendy, new, great location.

Disadvantages: Need to find a good deal to avoid some expense!

Oblique - Diagonal....see what I did there?!

When choosing a Hotel, I often find that the normal sound rules of picking somewhere with a good reputation, or on recommendation, don't quite excite me enough. After all - most of your time in the hotel is spent asleep, not looking at or experiencing anything except the mattress and the air conditioning.

Sometimes - a hunch is what you need. Call it the Ray Mears in me that loves a bit of adventure - surviving in a hut of twigs and eating berries - but not up to the Steve Irwin levels of playing with crocodiles.

And lo, I was perusing a certain last minute sort of website for a late deal to Barcelona one February (lovely time of year, quieter, cooler, cheaper). Bored of the bland and homogenous chains (there's an anti- chain feel to my reviews lately!), I plucked for a hotel from the Silken Group. A Spanish company, whose details and range you can read about in my earlier review on the Silken Berlaymont Brussels (go on, don't be shy). The website looked flash, the hotels a bit different, and one in particular (of 4 in Barcelona) was brand new and rather shiny. Having decided to be brave - I booked and awaited the surprised tones of my better half upon arrival.

Location: 205 Avenida Diagonal. Conveniently located on quite a few bus routes, but more importantly, just 200 yards from the Metro stop Plaza de las Glorias (Red Line) (5 minutes from Plaza de Catalunya), and the Trambesos stop of the Tram line that can whisk you to the beach in about 10 minutes. Without going into town you can also reach the Sagrada Familia in about 5 minutes, and Montjuic in about 15.

This part of town is to the North East of the City Centre - and is a growing Services Centre, with a brand new shopping and entertainment plaza directly across the road from the hotel, and of course right next door, the rather impressive Torre Agbar. A tall slender office block, with a tapering top half, and coloured panels and lighting to provide differing illumination, the Tower has become a new symbol of Catalan's prosperity, as well as something else to stick on postcards of the city's skyline.

The hotel is most impressive at night, lit subtly to enhance the black and white panelling of the exterior. It looked like it was either: a cutting edge design firm's office, or the kind of hotel that an Imperial Stormtrooper might stay in - all uniform and disciplined lines.
The building itself is detached, and so compared to most hotels built into a street, it looks quite small. Nevertheless there are 240 rooms in 4 categories: Comfort rooms, Club Silken Business, Corner rooms, and Suite 08 rooms. The Comfort rooms start at a nominal £60 a night, but the prices vary massively based on season, time of the week, the Exchange rate and special deals. We managed to get 4 nights for about £140 on a midweek out of season deal.

As you enter the reception, you feel as if you've stepped into an 80's Bond film, updated with modern materials. The curved walls of the lift area are ripples of bronze and brass, like the well appointed lair of an evil mastermind. The ceiling has round light tiles that reflect onto similarly kitsch furniture, in a wonderfully cool but not flash Ikea sort of way.
A small bar, called Piano Bar (no Piano - ironic, post-ironic, odd?) bedecked in dozens of bottles of Bombay Sapphire Gin, backlit in light blue and crystal panels was actually the first thing I noticed, as well as the white vinyl bar chairs with chrome foot rests.
After checking in with the impeccably polite and international staff and having purloined some of the small Silken sweets from the large bowl on the reception desk I decided to see what else was on the floor. A smart restaurant (serving the best of Catalan and Basque cuisine) and adjoining café at the back that serves all 3 meals (breakfast wasn't included sadly, no buffet for me!), stairs down to conference facilities and parking, and best of all - a pair of hanging swivel pods, white leather orbs with a cutaway chair that you fall into and are unable to get out of. Perfect for brooding malevolently whilst stroking a white cat..... there's the Bond thing again.

So - to the rooms. The corridor on my floor looked like a strange mix of Art Deco and a darkened Dick Tracy style cityscape. Perhaps a few bulbs were out...

The room was suitably sized for a hotel - but rather impressively a screen slid from the wall between the bathroom and bedroom to form a barrier at night. This also means that you can lie in bed and watch your other half showering through the glass wall. (Nice). The shower itself was an overhanging cascade feature, very welcome after a hard day's sightseeing. The windows were floor to ceiling - which did nothing for my acrophobia, but at least gave me excellent views of the adjacent Torre Agbar.

A quick word on the Toiletries - these are very easy to smuggle home with you, as the hotel has thoughtfully arranged each item in a small coloured box, all of which fit together like a jigsaw into a larger box. It's the little things I remember!

The room had the usual chair and table, TV, hairdryer on uselessly short lead, spare pillows etc....but I have to say that I really liked the décor: browns and muted blacks and whites, nothing flowery or unnecessary. I'm beginning to think I really am a secret German.

The only disappointment was that being February the rooftop pool was shut. The Catalan business clientele are clearly sissies as it was 18C outside and I'd have gladly swum about for a while.
And what a pool. Only 5 or so metres long, and rather Scalene in shape, surrounded by tables, it's more of a chill out with cocktails pool than one you'd attempt lengths in. The view however from the rooftop, with a low parapet and unobstructed by rampant apartment blocks is truly spiffing. You could see the glory of the Sagrada Familia, behind it to Parc Guell, round to Montjuic and the Olympic stadium, and down across the peaks of the Seu and the old town to the waterfront, with yacht masts and the Colon tower visible in the distance.

My stay at the Diagonal made me a fan of the Silken brand, mainly for the service, prices and originality of each hotel The Diagonal is certainly a bit different to most hotels, and the décor and layout do make you feel you're really being treated when you only stay in a standard room. Combining the easy transport links with a location away from the all day, all night bustle of the centre really helped to relax us when returning from sightseeing, and thoroughly enhanced our enjoyment of what is an amazing city.


Footnote: Why do the suggestions boxes offer only a general area to place the product in? This hotel is in the 'Hotels International' section - when quite clearly there is a Barcelona section..... a lot of help that will be if someone looks under the city name and can't find the hotel....And yet it still took 4 days to process the suggestion!

Summary: Brilliant hotel in a vibrant destination.