Text description provided by the architects. HAY Boutique Hotel and SPA by Edem Family in the heart of the ski resort Bukovel has two restaurants and a local SPA. That is the place for slowing down, uniting with nature, and immersing yourself in refined Carpathian authenticity.
The concept of the hotel grew out of admiration for the luxurious Carpathian nature. The botanical atlas includes 88 varieties of local herbs. Hence the hotel restaurants' names are 88 Vinotheque and 88 Daily Local. On hot summer days, the sun burns the grasses on the meadows, turning them into fragrant hay that gently rustles underfoot. This hay gave the hotel its name and became a central theme in its design.
The hotel building offers a 360-degree view of the Carpathian landscape. You can see a different part of the mountain slopes from the windows of each room. The building is organically integrated into the landscape and resembles a rock with cascades of plants. Local trees, grasses, strawberries, and blackberries decorate the facade, hotel terraces, and balconies. Plants change in the same way as it occurs in nature: some grow at the foot of the mountain, others at the slop and the top.
Refined decorative elements in the hotel lobby, its restaurants, and rooms showcase the design interpretation of the history of local craft traditions. Textiles from the Ukrainian studio Morgental are a new interpretation of Ukrainian symbols and charms. Rugs by Litvinenko Design is an author's look at traditional weaving from sheep's wool. Armchairs from the Ukrainian brand Noom are a new Ukrainian design inspired by the modernist's aesthetics and conquer the world with emotional minimalism.
The hotel has 40 rooms. Their interior has restrained tones and rich textures. In some of the rooms, the ceramic bathtub stands in the room next to the panoramic windows. Thus, you can enjoy the view directly from it. The unique tables in the rooms are reminiscent of the local blacksmithing tradition. The massive oak tabletop is fixed on an anvil-shaped cast-iron base. The lamp, integrated into the table's design, gives a cozy soft light through a texture made of pressed hay. The clothes hooks in the room are shaped like rough forged nails that you can meet in museums of antiquity. The metal staples that serve as furniture handles in the rooms are also a reference to the skill of Carpathian blacksmiths. The same large metal staples hold the wooden paneling around the columns in the restaurant.
One of the design features of HAY is a metal swimming pool on the 6th floor of the hotel. One part of the water path is indoors, and the other lies in the open space where you can enjoy the view through the end side of the pool made of glass. The bottom of the pool has round portholes opening into the ceiling of the lower floor corridor. Thus, the fifth-floor corridor became the HAY’s most Instagrammable place.