Hotel Karel

When is a hotel not a hotel? When it’s bakery with four rooms attached. The Karel is a bed - and breakfast, if you buy one of their pastries (which are very good). So it’s asking a pretty steep price for what it offers. Which was, in our case, a comfortable bed and a good shower in a room with a subterranean sleeping area and a polished concrete floor. You’ll admire the industrial chic all the more if you want someone to witness your ablutions. If you don’t, then the open plan bathroom and lavatory will make you think that the bb-otel has been somewhat less explicit in publicising its functions than you are going to be about yours. There were rough edges that meant it lacked a welcoming touch: an empty fridge without even a bottle of water; a kettle but only herbal tea bags; nowhere to hang a coat and no full length hanging space for clothes; light switches on one side of the bed only; a day when the room wasn’t made up and no one said why. The entire street was being dug up by vast earth moving machines so the bb-otel was approached on muddy duckboards. Not its fault but no-one mentioned that either. There’s no lounge, no front desk, indeed no-one around at all once the bakery is shut. It’s all quite impersonal - apart from when it’s very personal indeed.