Thompson Toronto Hotel travel tips and stories. Vacations ideas, cruises, spa and resorts

The Thompson Toronto Hotel opens its high-concept doors this year and promises to be ground-zero for the beautiful people. The hotel is located in this part of town called King West Village, where at every turn there is a construction site and gaping hole on the ground, or a lot with a target on its back. The Thompson Toronto is the first international arm of New York brand. The hotel is almost entirely glass and guests with haute expectations won’t be let down.

Bohemian chic meets art house wise meets quiet yet radical elegance” before name-checking Basquiat, Godard, and the Royal Tenenbaums, and quoting Kerouac. Evidently, Thompson aims to amalgamate disparate cool from throughout the last 60 years; so far, the formula has worked.

From the seventh floor of the hotel, a VIP club complete with rooftop pool, boasts an unobstructed 360degree sweep of the city, from the Victoria Memorial Park directly below, past the Bay Street contingent to the east, the city and onward. The crane-spiked horizon might imply a world of chaos, but for Thompson, its location is just a matter of opportunity.

The hotel has 16 floors and offers 102 rooms as well as monstrous 30,000 square feet of dining and event space, including three upcoming restaurants – New York?based Scarpetta with Chef Scott Conant, Wabora Sushi and the 24hr diner, Counter. The hotel smacks as both crisp and flamboyant, with clean lines and sober colours livened by expressive touches like the 125 foot by 12 foot high hand-painted, three dimensional mural of Toronto on the lobby wall by Spanish artist Javier Mariscal.

In terms of comforts, the rooms are a step up from the boutique-hotel norm, verging on business territory: biz travelers will be happy with the full-sized desks, IP telephones and wireless internet, leisure guests will make use of 42-plus-inch plasma televisions and floor?to?ceiling glass windows, and dark oak hardwood floors.