24 Beautiful Hotel Website Designs to Get Inspired

Mary Lou — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 17:16:06 +0000

A great website design can be a powerful tool for establishing a brand. In the hotel business, a website gives the chance to present the services and atmosphere that is being offered to the target group.

This collection demonstrates how hotel websites can incorporate beautiful design and target their audience in the right way.

During my search for inspiring hotel website designs, I encountered a surprisingly high number of luxury hotel websites that fail to accomplish the simple aim of beautifully presenting their facilities. It seems that online presence is still fairly underestimated although the number of direct online bookings are increasing.

Many hotel websites restrict their design to a clean, elegant but also mostly boring layout. Many use very small fonts, white backgrounds and show no effort to indulge the user. Of course, there are different target groups, from business to luxury, but each should be targeted in the best design way possible – after all it’s the hotel’s image that gets exposed here.

Many of the great design websites use flash to create nice effects especially with photos. In some pages this creates a long waiting time and I can also imagine that they are not SEO friendly. But for now, I want to focus on the overall impression, functionality of hotel websites might be another post topic.

Strangely, being a 5-star luxury hotel does not necessarily imply that the website can be categorized as such. On the contrary – many famous and glamorous hotels cannot really shine with their web presence. There is a lot do do and remake, designers!

Enough of talking, here are the hotel website designs that, in my opinion, do a great job in presenting their brand!
Enjoy!

1. http://www.littlepalmisland.com/

This is the first example for successfully transmitting the atmosphere of the resort. It is light, the containers are semi-transparent and the background is completely filled with tropical photos which just makes you want to jump into the water. It conveys the feeling: I want to be there!

2. http://www.palms.com/

The Palms Hotel in Las Vegas is another example of “I want to be there”. It shows a great video which puts you in party mood and gives you the idea that staying in their hotel means fun and excitement.

3. http://www.silvertoncasino.com/

Another Las Vegas Hotel/Casino website that impresses with vivid colors and a clear profile. It has a clean layout and despite of providing many pieces of information it is not cluttered.

4. http://www.plaza-athenee-paris.com/

This is the website of the Plaza Athene Hotel in Paris which is part of the Dorchester Collection. It has a unique style for every of it’s hotels (see the next one) but it keeps it’s great layout for each of them. The other hotels can be chosen from the neat image navigation.

5. http://www.beverlyhillshotel.com/

Another example of the Dorchester Collection websites.

6. http://www.wynnlasvegas.com/

Simply colored and a clear structure and with a touch of luxury – that’s the Wynn Website.

7. http://www.summithotels.com

An example of a compact accordion navigation (that could have been done with jQuery).

8. http://www.ariahotel.net/

This one’s design might not be a knock-out, but that playable piano at the top is just genius!

9. http://www.hollmann-beletage.at/

This is an example of vivid colors and a modern look. The navigation has a touch of sophisticated detail.

10. http://www.epichotel.com

A modern look in gray, beautifully clean.

11. http://www.sacher.com/

It looks just like a “Sacher Torte” cake package!

12. http://www.hotel-oxford.ro/

What a beautiful design! It’s a one page layout without scrolling, without clutter and sliding content. It conveys the modern and simplistic style of the hotel so well. Love it!

13. http://www.whitebarninn.com/

Another clean and simple design with a touch of romantic luxury.

14. http://www.faenahotelanduniverse.com/

I just want to keep it open and listen to the music! Although flash websites are very heavy it can be a really nice web experience when constructed well.

15. http://www.peninsula.com/

This design conveys tradition, history and professionalism. Check out the “Visiting for” accordion content.

16. http://www.themirahotel.com

This seems to be a modern hotel. Check out the unique cube navigation. It’s eye candy.

17. http://www.steinlodge.com/

This hotel website has a nice frame and a neat effect when hovering over the image or navigation.

18. http://ritz.com/

Royal Blue – beautifully luxurious looking design.

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