Bunk Hotel is a new structure created to bridge the gap between hostels and traditional hotels, offering rooms with attention to every detail at affordable prices, truly suitable for all budgets.
As founder Robin Hagedoorn explains:
it is obviously a long story. We wanted to create a model of hospitality that was simply fantastic, leaving behind cheap but not welcoming hostels and hotel chains with no personality. We wanted to give a touch of luxury at an affordable price, reflections and calculations were necessary to arrive at a model in which art, design and low economic demand converge
The young chain now has two hotels, both in the Netherlands. The first, inaugurated in 2019, is located in Utrecht; the second in Amsterdam, in the Amsterdam Noord district, reachable by a free ferry from the central station.
Bunk Hotel Amsterdam is housed in a deconsecrated church, the church of Santa Rita, dating back to 1921. As Anne Frank described in her diary, the church was bombed by the allied forces in 1943. After the war it was rebuilt with a larger bell tower. large and a longer central nave, but over time it lost its religious function. Since 1992 it has housed the offices of Universal Studios and a branch of the municipal library.
The exterior has been kept unchanged, only a fuchsia neon sign indicates that it is no longer a sacred place.
Inside, all the architectural details have been maintained; the pointed arches that define the nave from the entrance to the apse area, the capitals with the symbols of the evangelists, the original wooden roof, the organ once played during sacred services are still legible.
Discovering what Bunk offers is a real adventure: customers are invited to explore the spaces to discover a wooden library, a music recording room and a radio station that local artists can free use and a restaurant where the chandeliers have been replaced by bouquets of colorful tulips.
The hotel, which can accommodate up to 300 people in 106 rooms, offers different solutions for overnight stays. The cheapest ones are the 52 pods, single or double beds arranged in bunk beds, on the model of Japanese capsule hotels. The toilets are shared and customers have space for personal effects and the ability to adjust the intensity and color of the lighting.
The actual rooms have been created within white blocks that seem to float in the central nave: an island of prefabricated volumes with HPL laminate walls which is the heart of the structure. The boxes stacked on top of each other are connected by a secret staircase that winds in height climbing between one cube and another and which also leads to the recording studio.
The solutions are different: double, with bunk beds, with extra space, for three or four guests.
There are even the Epic Bunk rooms, located in particular corners of the former church and full of historical details or special features, and the exclusive Most Epic Bunk room, located right under the roof, with a freestanding tub and terrace.
