The newest hotels with robots — holidays of the future

The innovative community of Lake Nona has technology at its core. Recently, a hotel opened here and it includes smart windows, in-room tablets, and a mobile app for accessing guest services. Is this the future of hotels? Moreover, this hotel has robot lawnmowers to manage the ground and a kinetic chandelier, plus numerous pieces of digital art created to stimulate your imagination.

For the entire hotel industry, creating forecasts about hospitality trends is a huge thing. Focusing on a few forward-thinking hotels that are being developed nowadays, it's not impossible to imagine what would hotels look like in the future. Briefly, the new hotels will be a safe haven for all the guests’ experiences - even though we're going through a pandemic. But professionals are reacting to what's happening today and they agree to transform their hotels into high-tech oases. This also spreads to the number of hotel staff you meet, a number that becomes a problematic request in many forms. Because if you think about it, at what point does a hotel becomes unfriendly?

Digital assistance is probably the most essential tool for navigating the new hotels: smartphones are used for contactless communications via hotel apps and direct messaging. But they can also manage your virtual check-in, be your room key, operate various luxuries like TV and thermostat, and other guest services. Plus, paying for your room as well.

Some hotels even have a personal assistance app - this is used by Virgin Hotels for example. This has a number of abilities meant to make your life easier.

The adoption of these trends has been accelerated by COVID-19, and people have gotten used to using voice-controlled digital aids like Siri. The new guests have this knowledge and they have high expectations. The Westin Buffalo has put Echo devices in every room so that you can easily access various services like Pandora or even Spotify. Moreover, Alexa can answer questions about hotel services typically asked of staff. At check-out, the devices will be cleared of all personal data. Now let's talk about clean air. Because every guest will probably have questions about the persons renting the space before and the room being disinfected. However, the visual asceticism of 20th-century modernism, with its silky surfaces, neat stripes, and refusal of decoration, was the obvious effect of the past experiences with flu pandemics and other misfortunes. Hotel Ottilia from Copenhagen is using a self-sanitizing wall coating called ACT ClearCoat but it will cost around $2,500 per room.

Plus, the Ludlow Hotel in New York City uses a method created by CleanAirZone that mixes air into water, treated with natural enzymes to break down pollutants and eliminate the need to dispose of filters or use chemicals.

While still in the testing phase, researchers at University of Michigan and University of Tokyo have created a way to deliver electricity over the air to turn a space into a wireless charging zone. And that's just the beginning, as there are - or will be - more robots in hotels. The use of robots has increased during the last two years, for making a safer environment with ultraviolet light - killing bacteria and germs - for instance. But robots also are probably to manage other tasks. This is also a method to reduce labor costs. As community sites become more diverse, robots may be most prominent as bartenders. What is more, a bartending robot named Rob can chat in eight languages and can be seen on a MSC cruise ship.

Regarding the light in rooms, hotels have smart windows that automatically adjust to sunlight intensity and minimize heat to reduce energy consumption. Smart glass that changes from clear to opaque in milliseconds with an app is used as a separation between the bedroom and the bathroom.

For good and excellent sleep, expect luxury beds equipped with AI that will learn your sleep patterns and make you feel the most comfortable. One of these beds is the Bryte Restorative Bed, and you can find it in hotels like the London West Hollywood Fairmont, the Scottsdale Princess, or Cavallo Point in San Francisco. How do they work? They have an embedded sensory network that can detect biometrics like heart rate and breathing or your body's temperature. A bit scary? This bed can even wake you up when it's the time!

Last but not least, it's all about sustainable architecture. Sustainability will be a key driver of transformation and it denotes a challenge to energy-intensive hotels. One unexplored concept is for a circular floating hotel in Qatar that spins to generate its own power like a big hydro generator. Its roof is shaped like a vortex collecting rainwater, plus there are wind turbines in place.