London’s Bloomsbury has long enjoyed a decadent artistic heritage, and L’oscar – its latest big-budget, limited-room hotel – exemplifies this like no other before. It might sit within the walls of a 19th-century Baptist chapel, but there’s nothing restrained about this hotel; it’s even named after the master of all of the velvet-clad literary dandies, Oscar Wilde.
The hotel is the first British project from Jacques Garcia, the master of interiors who has previously brought us La Mamounia in Marrakech and Paris’s Hotel Costes. A wealth of decorative touches, from Arts & Crafts to mid-century, are artfully blended with original features to create a lavish, multi-textured space.
Sitting under the original dome of the octagonal, double-height chapel, L’oscar’s Baptist Grill and Bar is its crowning glory. The dome itself has been hand-painted with depictions of birds, insects and wild animals. Alongside the traditional grill menu, masterminded by Michelin star chef Tony Fleming, there’ll be a tableside Gueridon service for added theatre.
