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“Lots of people claim to be art hotels but Le Méridien is a lot more than an art hotel because we want to make culture accessible to the people and when we present art then it’s always in a new way and a new perspective,” says Ziegler.

“Jerome’s  role is to identify artists that we would use for the portal artworks on the doors, the artists with whom we do the key card artworks, identifying the right partners like  L’atelier des Chefs in terms of the cuisine experience, which is all about engaging in the creative processes and learning something new,” she says.

It seems that going forward, therefore, guests will start to really benefit from the three-year rebranding programme, noticing the extra services offered in the realm of art and cuisine, which Ziegler hopes will “differentiate Le Méridien”.

“The transformation has started, the real stuff is in the hotels and we will just need another two years to showcase it throughout arrival, in-room and cuisine in a holistic manner — but it has started and we are very excited,” says Ziegler.

“The performance that this integration pushed for the brand was tremendous over the last three years and it really shows the power of Starwood and its centralised service systems that lay now a platform from which to operate more effectively and efficiently, on which you can then build a brand upon in a very confident way.

“This brand is going to be really beautiful,” she concludes.

“Le Méridien had a lot of cache before, but it’s like a wrought iron — it was dusty and we shaped it now and brushed it and it will shine pretty soon.”        

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THE W STORY

Following her success at the helm of Le Méridien’s repositioning, Ziegler has added global brand leader of W Hotels to her role at Starwood.

“The W story is completely different to Le Méridien,” she says. “The character and personality of the two brands is very different, the starting point is very different; W is a brand that was created from scratch by Starwood in 1998 in New York.”

Ziegler explains that W was launched as the “category buster”, to transform the meaning of hotel and the meaning of luxury, making it “the leading lifestyle brand at the time of launch”.

“We want to provide an insider access to a world of wow,” she says.

It is fair to say that the brand has achieved this, with service branded under the idea of ‘whatever, whenever’ and even an in-hotel language, but the next challenge is to transform W from a “US-centric phenomenon to a truly global powerhouse”, says Ziegler.

“We have 27 hotels and by end 2011 we will have 60 plus hotels open in locations like London, Paris, Milan, Barcelona, Dubai, Amman, Shanghai and St Petersburg and also retreats like Ko Samui,” she says.

Of the brand’s launch in the Middle East in Doha in March, Ziegler comments: “For me the effect is almost the same that W had in New York in 1998, which is a total revolution of the scene”.

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