Snoozebox, The Portable Hotel

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  • 2015

  • Architectural
    Interior Design

Commissioned By:

Snoozebox Holdings plc

Designed In:

UK

Snoozebox is the portable hotel that delivers on-site event & festival accommodation, letting guests stay close to the action. Custom lorry trailers deliver six expandable rooms measuring 3.6m x 2m x 2m. Rooms can be adapted internally to suit a range of customers, providing a day room as well as seven different en-suite sleeping configurations ranging from a double, a double with singles, to a twin or four bunks. Tessellation of space & form around custom folding mechanisms maximizes space for guests and allows rooms to compact by 50% for transport. 100 rooms can be deployed in 24hr ready for guests. Custom furniture & textiles mixed with specified flooring & walls create a premium feel within a small space.


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  • CHALLENGE
  • SOLUTION
  • IMPACT
  • MORE
  • Snoozebox launched its first portable hotel at the British Grand Prix in 2011 and has since pioneered the market, providing accommodation at events, music festivals & sporting occasions in the UK as well as internationally. The first generation of rooms was built in shipping containers, with four rooms transported on the back of a lorry trailer. In 2014 Snoozebox briefed a 2nd generation with the aim of repositioning the hotel as premium accommodation & to increase the capacity of each room without increasing the footprint or cramping guests. Rooms had to be flexible to attract different consumers & offer day rooms, twins, double, triple & quads, in the same space and be transportable by lorry.

  • The relationship between space and mass, light and shadow, form and structure, texture and tactility, people and place, customer desires and business objectives were closely considered to transform the whole guest experience & offer accommodation that is premium, contemporary and flexible. By day guests are greeted with a finely upholstered sofa and an elegant writing desk. In the evening the beds, cleverly concealed in the structure, can be accessed with pull-down handles disguised as shadow lines to transform the space into a bedroom for up to four people, in a variety of configurations. Rooms have a luxury wet room en-suite and come in three different finishes to suit different clients and events.

  • To attract a range of customers, rooms have internal configuration flexibility, allowing for fast, tailored adaptation. Within the same space seven different en-suite options are possible, ranging from a double, a double with singles, to a twin or four bunks. Tessellation of space & form around custom designed folding mechanisms, that allow the beds to fold more successfully than a standard hinge, provides an increased living space within the same floor plan & allows the rooms to compact by 50% for transport. Offering premium accommodation, without having to drive offsite, enhances customer's experience of events as one can enjoy a beer at the races or a music festival, without suffering a night under canvas.

  • The portable hotel rooms comply with applicable standards and regulations for a commercial hotel. The portable lorry trailers, which carry six rooms, come with a built in fire alarm system, which is activated after the rooms have been deployed and made ready for guests. The portable rooms walls are fire retardant & soundproofed and the doors are fire & acoustic. Fold down beds are safely stowed; their movement is self-dampening to remove the effective weight of the bunk as it is deployed for use. The moving parts for the folding mechanisms are all inaccessible to fingers to protect the user from harm. A safe hidden under the day sofa provides a space for guests to keep valuables.

    Custom furniture and textiles were mixed with specified flooring & walls to achieve a premium feel. Furniture is fabricated from laser cut parts to produce high quality form and finish suitable for the volume of production. They allow greater functionality than wood based materials and are lower cost than composite or tooled alternatives. Light composite materials that withstand vibration in transit were selected for the wall claddings. Bespoke LED layered throughout the room creates a soft light space. The whole solution offers grand-scale sophistication in the tightest of spaces.

    Improved guest experience and room flexibility has widened Snoozebox's appeal and firmly positioned the hotel as premium accommodation. Increasing capacity, from four rooms to six, has improved the revenue potential for each truck by 50%. The need for skilled labour and specialist equipment has been reduced as rooms have integrated systems and hydraulically self-deploy. Speed and ease of deployment has improved efficiency by 70% and reduced haulage costs by 33%. A hotel of 100 rooms can now be deployed within 24hrs; previously this took a team of the same size six working days. A hotel can now operate at a different location every week, rather than once a month, thus providing greater commercial opportunity.

    Snoozebox is the first premium portable hotel accommodation that is highly flexible and exceptionally space efficient. Within the same compact footprint, 7 en suite configurations are possible, a day room and a variety of sleeping arrangements. By exploiting specialist laser cutting & folding processes, fold-down beds hide within metal frames integrated into the walls. The bathroom is designed as a luxury wet room; its footprint is restricted by the need to accommodate the walls & floor of the room as they fold for transportation. Utilising the space above the folding area, the bathroom flares outwards to give a greater freedom of movement and a perception of spaciousness, whilst cleverly providing a dry area.