This article first appeared in City & Country, The Edge Malaysia Weekly on December 21, 2020 - December 27, 2020

KLoé (pronounced “Chloe”) Hotel in Jalan Bukit Bintang, Kuala Lumpur, has taken social media by storm since its opening early this year — mainly for its “Instagrammable” design and the offerings of five signature artist lofts.

The hotel, which occupies 0.42 acres, offers a total of 85 hotel rooms in an 8-storey U-shaped building. The facilities include a swimming pool, multipurpose hall and pool deck on the first floor of the hotel. There is a restaurant, called Monroe, next to the pool.

The standard rooms are 240 sq ft in size, while the courtyard rooms are 280 sq ft. The artist lofts, which have a living space and a sleeping space, measure 480 sq ft. These lofts are the result of a collaboration with experts in their respective fields to create spaces in which to indulge in books, music, gardens, art and food: read (curated by independent bookshop Tintabudi), listen (DJ Ruby La Faber), grow (botanical art platform Ohsum Mossum), draw (artist Joee Cheong) and taste (celebrity chef Sarah Benjamin).

The land was previously occupied by a bungalow, which Ng Ping Ho, owner of KLoé, used as his office when he was in the TV production business. The bungalow was subsequently demolished to make way for the construction of the hotel in 2015. Ng is the director of Kindness of Strangers Sdn Bhd, a hospitality company that also runs LOKL Coffee and BackHome backpacker hostel in Jalan Tun H S Lee.

The exterior of the hotel features designs that are unusual in city hotels — open corridors and perforated external walls. Inside the hotel, concrete-style wall finishing, woods, metals and stones are among the main features.

Ng says the idea of an open corridor came from architect Masyerin M Nor, who is the managing director of Domaine Architects Sdn Bhd. It was the first time the duo were developing a hotel from scratch and they had a shared emphasis — to build a hotel that uses as little energy as possible.

“We normally see open corridors in low-cost flats or beach resorts but we don’t see it in city hotels … We wanted to do it [in KLoé Hotel] so that we would not have to put air conditioning or ventilation in the corridors,” he tells City & Country during an interview in the hotel lobby.

“Many developers will use the green name to brand their projects but, for us, we have to be responsible and use as little energy as possible. It can be expensive at the start but, in the long run, you can save on the cost. A lot of things we do here are just practical things, and not high-tech stuff.”

The “practical things” Ng is referring to are mainly the passive design system, which includes the building’s orientation, the use of perforated walls with minimal openings on the east and west façade, the design of the courtyard as well as the incorporation of natural materials and greenery.

Some wood materials from the previous bungalow structure were repurposed for the hotel foyer. All these elements were thought through from the start of the conceptualisation process.

Masyerin explains that the passive design system is about nature and a comfortable environment for the guests. For a start, KLoé Hotel is orientated in the north-south direction to avoid too much direct sunlight.

“As we take advantage of the sunlight, there won’t be too much of it that it will heat up the space. The east and west sides have just enough sunlight coming in, as we use perforated walls. The staircases by the side act as a buffer that prevents heat from entering the internal walls and rooms,” he says.

“Most buildings are green now, anyway; buildings have to attain a certain level of greenness, in line with the government’s guidelines. Green is not about shouting to be green, but it is about making it comfortable. For example, there are ‘say no to straws’ campaigns, but many F&B operators still use plastic cups … We don’t want to do that sort of green idea.”

He adds that the materials used in the hotel building help with the indoor air quality. The wall is finished with water-based coating rather than paints that contain harmful chemicals of volatile organic compounds. Instead of polymer materials, natural ones such as metal, wood and stone are used in the building.

The furniture is sourced locally, a move that Masyerin believes has helped reduce the carbon footprint in the transport process. “Malaysia has creative craftsmen and their work is better than many imported products,” he says.

In the open corridors, black aluminium cladding with vertical sun-shading fins have been placed on the external walls to block heat from the outside. Trees are also planted at the hotel entrance to provide shade for the lobby area.

Instead of being designed as a square building to increase the number of rooms, KLoé Hotel is a U-shaped hotel, which creates space for a courtyard from the first floor up. This design allows for cross-ventilation in the building, and the swimming pool on the first floor also helps lower the temperature in the building.

An active design system in the form of motion sensors is used in the rooms to control the use of electricity, Masyerin says.

“We don’t know how well it is working yet … With the motion sensor, the electricity will be turned off if there is no movement in the room. We are still learning how to use it because, sometimes, the sensor is very sensitive … It can even sense the movement of the wind that enters the building. It is a complicated adjustment,” he adds.

“That’s why we focus on the passive system because, when you use an active system, there will be hiccups and it will take time for us to deal with it and wait for it to be stabilised. Similarly, we have a water fountain next to the lobby that uses recycled water. We are still testing it because we haven’t achieved the desired results yet.”

There were times when Ng and Masyerin doubted some of their decisions, and realised that sacrifices had to be made along the way. For one, they questioned whether an open corridor was feasible and they even considered the potential solutions if the idea failed.

“Open corridors might have issues such as rainwater splashing in, dust and noise … but, to our surprise, when the building was completed, it was not as bad as we had anticipated. In fact, it is pleasant to walk in the corridors. There is not much temperature difference when you walk out of the air-conditioned room,” Ng says.

“We are often asked why we carved out the courtyard, because we could have built more rooms instead. We think the courtyard can bring life to the building. We have also been asked why we didn’t make it taller to increase the number of rooms, but my question is, why should we? The cost of utilities will rise once a building goes beyond a certain height, as a different category of system [such as the elevator facility] is required. This difference sets us apart from other hotels and we can demand good room rates.”

Another sustainability move by the hotel is that it does not provide a breakfast buffet spread to reduce food waste. Guests who opt for the room and food package can order food from an à la carte menu.

The hotel, which has a no-plastic policy, has invested in a water filter, from which glass bottles are refilled and placed in the rooms.

From the start, the goal has been for KLoé Hotel to be a boutique hotel that offers the local community as well as Malaysians in general a different experience, according to Ng. As such, he and Masyerin have planned for a communal environment and facilities.

“We are targeting the neighbourhood … Usually, hotel facilities are for the use of guests only, but we want this space to be used daily by the working crowd. We rent out the multipurpose hall and the tenant organises yoga, Pilates and meditation classes for the working crowd. They can have classes before and after work, while grabbing coffee at the café on the ground floor,” he says.

“We see people coming in for classes, doing their work at the lobby and meeting with their friends. Hotel guests know that, when they stay here, they are seeing a wide range of people from around the area. For us, that’s the main reason for the hotel.”

This plan has in fact worked well for the hotel during the Movement Control Order (MCO) period, as many Malaysians have turned to boutique hotels for a staycation. Ng says the hotel had garnered a lot of interest before the official launch of operations in early March, but the bookings have been affected by the MCO.

During the Recovery MCO, it obtained bookings of an average of 50 rooms a night during weekends. The café and restaurant are doing well too, he adds.

To create a neighbourhood hotel, the duo decided to have the lobby on the ground floor. Thus, it was necessary to have a basement car park, which is more expensive than a podium car park.

Masyerin notes that the hotel is also limited by the shallowness of the ground as the rock formation level is reached after two underground levels.

“We want the lobby to be on the street level so people can just walk in freely. Normally, if the lobby is on a higher floor, people will feel intimidated to take the lift to go up for coffee. We want to create a welcoming environment,” he adds.

The duo’s first project was backpacker hostel BackHome, a result of the restoration of several pre-war shophouses. They then started the conceptualisation of KLoé Hotel in 2010.

Construction commenced in 2015, after delays caused by issues such as confirming the alignment of the MRT Sungai Buloh-Kajang line.

Ng says the challenges in developing this hotel included the small land size, the need for the basement levels, the nearby MRT line as well as the limestone formation that came with a lot of water.

“It is in the middle of KL, so it takes a long time to get the building materials into KL … We also had to rent an additional site next to the hotel as a staging site because the site is small. It was the first time we were building a hotel, so there was a lot to learn and we added details here and there. The construction took four years and was completed in end-2019,” he says.

Looking ahead, Ng’s priority is to implement a green operation, such as plastics recycling and food waste management. He hopes to come up with a loop solution for KLoé Hotel to achieve a long-term sustainability practice.

“This is for the long-term impact, and a good design helps. We have to make sure the green practice is sustainable and that the staff understand it. It is a learning curve for us,” he says.

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