Yotel at Gatwick Airport

A new option for travellers who are looking for a version of Japanese capsule hotels opened at London’s Gatwick Airport yesterday. Yotel is the creation and first hotel of the founder of restaurant chain Yo Sushi, Simon Woodroffe.

Yotel features 46 cabins, either Standard size 7 sq.metres or Premium size 10 sq.metres, which can be rented by the hour or day. Rooms must be rented for a minimum of four hours and Standard cabins start at £25 and increase by £5 an hour up to a day rate of £55, Premium cabins start at £40.

The concept of Yotel is to make luxury affordable and the company says ‘We’ve used the language of business class airlines because they know how to use a small space and some of the technology of luxury yachts to create our cabin system.’ Premium cabins have a 2m x 1.3m bed that deploys into a couch at the touch of a button and there are bedside charging points, personal lighting, dimming control and a retractable storage area below the bed for suitcases. The luxury bathroom includes overhead rain shower, a hand shower, hairdryer, heated mirror and soft towels.

There’s a study desk and chair that folds out of the wall and all cabins come with free wired and Wi-Fi internet connections and a flat screen tv. 24 hour room service is available. The handy thing about Yotel is that its located in the South Terminal of Gatwick Airport on the lower level below the arrivals area, if you had six hours seven hours to kill before your plane was leaving this is a viable alternative to hanging around the airport terminal.