The Ned London

"Dutch courage isn’t just for dates. After a couple of £11 Venice Beach Ice Teas and a salt beef slider in the Nickel Bar at The Ned, everyone doesn’t just like each other. They love each other. By 3am you’ll find yourself in a WhatsApp group with two Swedish diplomats, the daughter of someone from Downton Abbey and Top Bloke Simon, who’s a soil conservationist. Whatever that means. A bar of many talents, The Nickel Bar also serves breakfast from 8am, so if that after party at Sven’s gets a little out of hand they’ve also got the somehow inevitable Nedgroni hangover covered. We haven’t been here yet, but want you to know this spot exists." - Team Infatuation

"The Ned is a lifestyle hub in a historic building, offering dining options, a wellness level with a pool and spa, and 250 guest rooms with 1920s flair. It also features several dining options and a rooftop pool for Club members." - Laura Dannen Redman, Charu Suri, Sandra Ramani, Katherine LaGrave, Jennifer Flowers, Laura Holt

"Dutch courage isn’t just for dates. After a couple of £11 Venice Beach Ice Teas and a salt beef slider in the Nickel Bar at The Ned, everyone doesn’t just like each other. They love each other. By 3am you’ll find yourself in a WhatsApp group with two Swedish diplomats, the daughter of someone from Downton Abbey and Top Bloke Simon, who’s a soil conservationist. Whatever that means. A bar of many talents, The Nickel Bar also serves breakfast from 8am, so if that after party at Sven’s gets a little out of hand they’ve also got the somehow inevitable Nedgroni hangover covered." - heidi lauth beasley, jake missing

"The founders of Soho House and the developers behind such buzzy hotels as New York City’s The NoMad teamed up to turn the historic Midland Bank building into—what else?—a one-stop lifestyle hub that’s drawing regulars of both the suit-and-tie and hipster variety. Part-hotel, part-member’s club, The Ned (named for the moniker of legendary, 19th-century architect Edwin Lutyens, who first envisioned the building) features eight dining options set around the former banking hall, from Italian, French, and Californian spots to a New-York-style deli, Pan-Asian favorite, and lounge for an overflowing, British-style Sunday feast, complete with a Bloody Mary bar and mimosa trolley. Hotel guests also have access to a downstairs bar, and a wellness level with a nail bar, gym, separate hair salon and barbershop, Cowshed Spa, traditional Moroccan hammam, and vitamin IV drips by The Elixir Clinic. The spa level also features an indoor pool, while the Ned’s Club Upstairs offers a rooftop pool and restaurant (with views out to St. Paul’s Cathedral) to Club members or those staying in higher-category rooms. The entire property is done up in cool, vintage-inspired design, including the 250 guestrooms, which range in category from Crash Pad and Cosy to Heritage and six types of suites. All feature 1920s flair, such as mirrored cocktail cabinets, wingback chairs, and Jazz Age motifs, as well as marble-mosaic bathrooms stocked with rainfall showers and 10 full-size Cowshed products. Suites have bonus perks like dining areas, bathtubs, and upgraded views. Take all the pictures you want in your room, but Insta-addicts may want to leave their phones behind when in select public areas: there’s a photo ban in any place that’s part of the Club membership, including that stunning rooftop."

"How did it strike you on arrival?When it rains, it pours. The Square Mile of the City of London, land of suits and proper pints, was short of exciting hotels, and then, in 2017, along came an urban resort. Dreamed up by Soho House founder Nick Jones, The Ned has nine restaurants, 15 bars, a spa, two pools and a members’ club. The imposing hulk of a building used to be the headquarters of the Midland Bank, and seven of those nine restaurants are arranged, food-court style, around the emerald marble columns and checkerboard floor of the soaring lobby, which is where the bank tellers used to sit. This makes for an impressive, if disconcerting, entrance. What’s the crowd like?City slickers—suits and shorts in equal measure. The good stuff: Tell us about your room.The rooms are characterful for such a huge scale (there are 252 of them) and have brass or walnut bed frames, vintage-look floral wallpaper, wooden floors, and Afghan rugs. The crash pads are just as well done but minuscule and should only be used as the name suggests. Please tell us the bathroom won’t let us down.Bathrooms have mosaic tiles, rainforest showers, and Cowshed products. Large rooms and upwards also get a bath. Maybe the most important topic of all: Wi-Fi. What’s the word?Free. Anything stand out about other services and features? Whether it’s childcare, gyms, spas, even parking—whatever stuck with you.If you don’t fancy eating in the open, Lutyens Grill does perfect steaks (and little else) in what used to be the bank manager's office. When it comes to pampering, there’s a Cowshed Spa, nail bar, barber shop, hair salon, and hammam. Only guests in the larger rooms gain access to the rooftop, with its heated pool, and the Vault bar, arguably the highlight of the whole affair, cocooned among 3,000 gleaming safe deposit boxes. What was most memorable—or heartbreaking—about your stay?Walking through the 20-ton vault door into the members’ club makes you feel like an extra in Oceans Eleven. Bottom line: worth it, and why?Intimate this hotel isn't—you could lose weeks in here—which, depending on your disposition, could be heaven or hell." - Laura Goulden