I really enjoyed my stay at the Zurich Airport Radisson Blu. Yes, it’s probably one of the weirdest airport hotels I’ve every stayed at, but it’s convenience (and bold decor) made it one to remember.
A full review of my 1 night stay at the Radisson Blu at the Zurich Airport
It wasn’t totally necessary for me to stay at a hotel located adjacent to the airport, since my flight home to San Diego wasn’t scheduled to depart until 1:25 p.m. the next afternoon.
I could have very easily stayed one more night at the Four Points Sheraton in Sihlcity, but…well…it’s fun to watch airplanes from my own little private hole in the wall. This Raddison Blu connected to the main terminal at ZRH was an opportunity that I wasn’t going to pass up.
Location map of the Radisson Blu Zurich Airport. If you could zoom all the way in, you’d see me there smiling from ear to ear in approval of it’s excellent proximity to the main terminal.
Checking in
I’m going to let the pics tell the story of my one night stay here at the Radisson blue ZRH, so here we go:
If you are as horrible with directions as I am, you might have some difficulty finding the entrance to the Radisson Blu here at ZRH. Don’t give up though, because this is a hotel worth finding!The layout is essentially a hollowed-out cube, which is very similar to the Westin at DTW. BTW, this the main lobby, complete with the most obnoxiously-cool wine storage and retrieval device I have ever seen. I’m not much of a wine drinker, but if I was, I’m pretty darn sure that I would choose the bottle at the very top.Here’s another view of the lobby from the elevator. This is cool!Fun fact: the style, design, and mood of the guestroom hallways is the exact opposite of the design, style, and mood of the rooms themselves. Scroll down a bit and you’ll see what I mean (and prepare yourself for an onslaught of color)!They gave me room 525, which they promised would have an “airport view.”I paid extra for it, so it better be true.
The room
*poof!* Any thoughts I had about airport views were obliterated as soon as I opened the door and saw the blue carpet.Prior to this moment, if anyone would’ve told me that they thought that blue carpet was a good idea (anywhere), I would have assumed them to be bat-shit crazy. But you know what? As nuts as it sounds, it didn’t take long for me to think that this looked pretty darn cool. Perhaps it is I who is bat-shit crazy…“Radisson Blu” is a totally appropriate name for this place. This is even more vivid than my experience at the Austin W Hotel!Yes, I was totally disappointed that the bed wasn’t red. How cool (and gloriously tacky) would that have been?!I’m willing to bet that the designers actually tried a version with a red bed, but laughed it off with the realization that they would be scaring people away at that point. You can only use so much red in such a confined space such as this before it starts getting scary!Is it wrong that I really like this color combination?Part of the reason why I like this color combo so much is the fact that it dares to be bold and SO much different than all of the other cookie-cutter airport hotels in this world (no offense to the IAH Marriott).The only thing that concerns me about this decor is the fact that it doesn’t at all match the other Radisson Blu I stayed at several years ago. Maybe things have changed since then, but as of this moment I honestly couldn’t tell you what the Radisson Blu brand is all about.It’s the weirdest piece of furniture that I’ve ever seen in any hotel room, but it ended up being the most practical. Not only is it a convenient place to unpack and pack a backpack (say that three times fast), you can sit there and think about whether or not it’s wise to publicly admit that you actually like blue carpet.This complementary water must have felt really fancy to me at the time because…well…my raised pinky in the mirror tells all.Looking at all these pics again as I upload them to this review is making me think that this is – by far – the most colorful hotel room that I have ever stayed in. And I liked it!This little nugget of goodness was sitting on the desk upon my arrival.“GET IN MY BELLY!”There was also this fancy whiz-bang coffee machine which made me feel slightly disappointed that I’m not a coffee drinker.Oh! I’ve been so distracted by the quirky colors and snacks that I completely forgot to mention one of the most important parts about this room: the view!
The view of the airport from my room
Note that not all airport-facing rooms have views of the runways! Floors 1 through 3 will have you looking directly into the terminal building, so you’re going to need a room on the 4th floor or higher to be able to see anything.
You’re also going to need to make sure that you bring your favorite rocket ship underwear (and lots of cash for room service) to get the full AvGeek experience.
I didn’t have a direct line of sight to any of the gates attached to the main terminal, but…The wind happened to be blowing just right and it was nice to watch a steady stream of departing aircraft like this one all evening.
The bathroom
And if you’re wondering, yes, even the bathroom was drenched in color.This toilet though. While I appreciated all of it’s fancy electronic features, the way that it automatically raised and lowered the seat cover every time I walked into the bathroom started to get annoying and I was desperately looking for a way to turn it off. Having a little extra help in the bathroom is nice sometimes, but I swear it had a personality of it’s own and it was creepy as hell!There was no tub in this room, but thankfully the shower made up for it by being large enough to walk around in.Just be thankful that I was fully clothed when I took this picture. I haven’t been burned by any unnoticed “revealing” reflections in any of my hotel review pics yet, but you know how obtuse I can be at times so I can’t promise that it’ll never happen.
Final thoughts
So there you have it. Despite feeling a bit of shock and horror as I opened the door and saw that crazy neon blue carpet with all the daring red accents, it actually grew on me fairly quickly. I consider it to be one of the more stylish hotel rooms I’ve stayed at in a while.
I wouldn’t go as far as to call it classy, but it was certainly stylish and edgy in a way that I quite liked. Remember though – I’m a guy who wears bright red shoes with the matching red watch (who has been tempted to dye my hair blue before), so when it comes right down to it this room and I were a match made in heaven.
This is an excellent airport hotel with really good plane spotting opportunities. If that’s your kind of thing, make sure you ask for an airport-facing room on the highest floor possible.
