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A great first impression is the gateway to a great hotel experience. When a guest enters your lobby, your aesthetic choices are at the forefront of their mind and sometimes it takes more than a friendly staff and comfortable furniture to turn a simple entryway into a grand entrance.

The hospitality industry has a particularly high turnover of trends and what's new-and-now will become dated in short order. Simple décor pieces are the quickest, most cost-effective way to refresh a space without having to commit to high-cost measures. From quick fixes to timelessly tasteful investments, you'll love the energy that a well-curated lobby can bring to your hotel.
 

Fill Blank Walls with Finished Canvases

Every wall is a blank canvas and opportunities to spruce up these sprawling spaces are endless. Consider the interior design and styling of your space and, from there, choose a theme to center your artistic choices around. Without becoming redundant, embrace continuity and find wall art that can be easily moved from area to area for an easy and instant refresh.

Commercial spaces often face specific size and styling needs and the flexibility offered by Wendover Art can meet these requirements with ease. Beyond NBF's website, our sales team can custom-order any of the shown pieces in any combination of sizes, finishes, matting, and more. Large-scale hospitality projects can be made easy with the company's cohesive and extensive offerings. Call our sales team at 800-558-1010 today to learn more.

Shown:
Wendover Art
Set of Sculptures
Rivet Loveseat
Urban Stool
Artificial Plants
Area Rug

 

Plant a Stylish Seed

Bringing the outside world into indoor spaces has become a trending topic in interior design. From simple accents to elaborate plant walls, a little bit of greenery goes a long way in social spaces. Be considerate of natural sunlight and ensure that you're taking advantage of well-lit areas by focusing those spaces on live, thriving varietals. As you go deeper into the building, you'll want to consider higher-end, convincing lookalikes. From succulents to ferns and the classic ficus to bamboo, there's a wealth of options to choose from.

Sometimes, naturally-inspired décor takes on a two-dimensional form. From wallpaper with bold tropical leaves to electrically-charged florals, bathing an accent wall in a daring plant-inspired print creates a statement that's hard to resist. As trends change, these choices can be easy to remove by selecting commercial-grade temporary wallpaper, providing the option for continual refreshes without a high-cost commitment.

 

 

Let Form Meet Function

Artistry goes beyond paintings, prints, and sculptures. Your furniture can become the perfect intersection of style with substance, embracing design quirks and curiosities that can enhance a space as much as any other décor decisions. Let the latest trends in commercial furniture, often showcased at Chicago's NeoCon conference, guide you towards pieces that are simply stunning.

Integrate particularly bold pieces into your lobby by creating an otherwise minimalist backdrop. By outfitting surrounding areas with clean lines and neutral upholstery, an avant garde meeting area will draw attention without adding to too much background noise.
 

Shown:
Rivet Chair
Rivet Loveseat
Rivet Sofa
Rivet Bench / Table
Rivet Bookshelves
Wendover Art
Artificial Plants

 

It's Time to Highlight Your Ambient Light

From sprawling resorts to petite boutique properties, buildings of all shapes and sizes can only put so much leverage on natural light. A combination of inset bulbs, hanging lanterns, and tabletop lamps should be carefully considered to set the right mood for your design aesthetic. At the very center of any good lighting scheme, the right bulb hue is integral. Emphasize clean, bright lines with vibrant white LEDs and blue-hued incandescents or bolster the warming feeling of a cozy corner with softer, more yellow-toned light. There's room for everything in-between, as well as building a gradient from space to space to inspire different moods.

Coordinate these choices with fixtures that fit the bill. Guests naturally prefer lighting that's within reach, yet these wide-open spaces still need overhead lighting to succeed. Install dimmer switches on ceiling-mounted fixtures and keep those at a comfortable level, allowing smaller, more decorative light sources to shine.  

 

Want to love your lobby even more?
Check out NBF's hospitality offerings
online and in our digital catalog.

Tips
Reception Area

More From NBF

Build a Better Hotel Lobby

It isn't just any reception area—a hotel lobby is an important first impression that sets the tone for guests' visits, introducing the hotel's aesthetics. From wall art to paint colors to flooring and beyond, you must perfectly coordinate every design choice to tell your space's story without words.

For this reason, it's easy to go all-out and run through your budget in no time. While it's worth adding a few extra bucks to your estimates, it's also important to stay within guidelines to ensure that the newly-curated or freshly-refreshed space is both feasible and beautiful.

Furniture is one of the most endlessly customizable choices for a great greeting area, yet it remains one of the priciest. Make careful choices while embracing new-and-now trends without forgetting about the future.

Enduring Style

While truly timeless trends are few and far between, some design sensibilities have stayed en vogue for longer than others. Look to the past and see what stuck around—vintage style is currently "in," but high-traffic areas demand the durability of modern build quality and materials. 

Companies have embraced Scandinavian slopes for ages, elaborating on the tradition of high-quality pieces with a modern flair. Similarly, midcentury modern may have a variety of distinct visuals, but its core tenets—such as hairpin legs, knife edges, and affable mid-tone finishes—are consistent.

When in doubt, embrace simplicity. Clean lines will always stay chic, and simple angles aren't going anywhere. Simple shapes and basic builds allow less expensive, easier-to-replace décor to shine, making a design face-lift easier to execute and less weighty on the wallet. Select high-quality pieces to ensure your furniture will stand up to even more years of use.

Durability by Design

Some materials are better suited to heavy traffic areas than others. By their nature, hotels see high turnover and necessitate rigorous, quick, and intensive cleaning beyond guest rooms. Lobby furniture—from couches to countertops—faces the same demands. Scratch and stain-resistant high-pressure laminate is an ideal alternative to veneers or costly wood solids, pairing perfectly with high-quality upholsteries that have been tested, treated, and certified to stand up to rigorous use.

Expanded Options

While it's ideal to mix-and-match collections to avoid a static, boring look, it's also worth pursuing lines and brands with a wide variety of pieces. Maintaining cohesion can go beyond the entryway; coordinating benches and storage in a hallway can keep the hotel's vision clear beyond the lobby and throughout the building.

Larger lines of furniture also allow for expansion when necessary. If a future refresh comes up, it's easy to keep your existing furniture in rotation while adding new pieces that weren't previously required. Choose several series of seating, tables, and storage that can be supplemented or replaced as needed.

Modular Choices

For a quick update and change of pace, there's nothing easier than switching up the lobby's layout. Modular, reconfigurable collections are designed to be rearranged repeatedly, coming together in endless configurations while maintaining cohesion in casual seating and waiting areas. Keeping up with consistent finishes and upholstery will further enhance flexibility, giving you the option to move any of your pieces all around the space.

The Bare Necessities

While seating areas, lobby bars, and business centers might put the "fun" in "functional spaces," you still need reception mainstays that need to be cohesive, durable, and ready for long, hard hours of work. Every guest will inevitably step up to the front desk at least once during their stay, filling out paperwork, setting down luggage, and knocking into corners during chaotic check-in and checkout times. A well-made reception desk is worth the splurge. Look for a few must-have features to ensure both guest and employee comfort:

  • Extremely durable, easy-to-clean laminate or thick, shatterproof glass construction

  • Ample wire management grommets and raceways to accommodate computer terminals

  • Wide enough stations to accommodate multiple employees and computers

  • ADA-accessible service stations with low-set, ample overhangs

  • Ample storage space to keep supplies and files at arms' reach

While desks and files are important, consider office chairs rated for 24-hour use to accommodate every shift from early morning to overnight. Furthermore, remember employees beyond the front desk agents, and ensure that security stations and valet checkpoints are outfitted with the right furniture to stay safe, comfortable, and content on the job.

 


 

Hospitality Furniture for Company Events

Is your business preparing for an event? You’re going to need the right furniture, and chances are that you may not already have it on hand. Having the right furnishings to support your guests and your event can help everything to run smoothly. Here are a few furniture items to consider when it comes to hosting any company event.

Top Trends From NeoCon 2019

As is tradition, National Business Furniture sent a delegation of merchandisers, marketers, space planners, and a copywriter to NeoCon-- "the commercial design industry's launch pad for innovation" and one of the largest furniture trade shows in the country. In one fast-paced day, we gathered inspiration from the top minds in the industry and saw the trends that will inspire commercial offices, educational spaces, healthcare facilities, hospitality environments, and residential design for the coming years. As always, a few of the best and brightest trends really caught our eyes.

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Sam Pekarske

Sam Pekarske is a commercial and creative copywriter, lending a voice to National Business Furniture's products and resources one pun at a time.