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Best Western Plus

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Written by Roma Publications

Best Western Plus Pinewood on Wilmslow Hotel

Best Western

The Best Western Plus Pinewood on Wilmslow Hotel, Handforth has recently undergone refurbishment to create an extension which provides more rooms and a modern feel to the hotel.

Located close to Manchester Airport, work was undertaken by Allison Pike Partnership and McGoff & Byrne.

Speaking to Premier Hospitality magazine, Mark Allison, Director at Allison Pike Partnership said: “An investment into the first phase of the hotel’s transformation was successful and the client wanted to increase the capacity of the hotel from 70 rooms to 89 rooms. At the moment there are also roadworks underway to link the site directly with Manchester Airport and the new dual carriageway that will open next year, so I think the client felt that it was the right time to invest in the hotel and increase the number of rooms.”

The hotel is described as a Victorian villa with a 1970s flat topped bedroom wing adjacent. As part of the redevelopment, the hotel has been turned into a four-storey building incorporating a 19 bedroom extension.

Mark added: “As part of phase one, we felt we had maximised what we could with the older part of the building and had extended the ground floor with the restaurant. We then looked at the feasibility of extending the bedroom wing and looked at various options. The preferred option was to build another floor. The project involved a 19 bedroom rooftop extension on top of the 1970s reception/bedroom wing, a façade improvement and a thermal upgrade on the whole of that wing.

“We were trying to achieve a clear definition between the Victorian villa and the modern addition. It was about unifying the modern additions so that they all had a contemporary feel. The recladding of the wing, which was previously bronze, aluminium and black glass was quite a contemporary statement in its day, but it looked very dated and was not in a fantastic condition. This was the opportunity to add a new floor and re-clad the building to give it some unity.”

Best Western

Allison Pike Partnership was also asked to maximise the number of garden view rooms at the hotel.

“Because the garden is such a pre-eminent feature of the whole site, we have created 10 garden view rooms with 8 standard rooms and one universally accessible room,” said Mark.

Design work started on the project in November 2014 with work on site beginning in October 2015. The project was then handed back to the client on 9th May 2016.

Mark said: “Feedback has been very positive. The client is very happy with the appearance of the scheme and it now has a unity externally with a much more modern and contemporary character to the reception and bedroom wing. Guest feedback on the rooms is also very positive. They are very popular with corporate guests during the week and they work well for leisure and function guests at weekends.”

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Roma Publications