I’ve done my fair share of traveling. I’ve stayed at Holiday Inns in the midwest and luxury resorts in the Greek Islands. I’ve slept at the high end, the low end and everywhere in-between. But hands-down, my favorite hotel experience of all time goes to the QT Gold Coast in Surfers Paradise.
If mid-century modern stylings with a heavy dose of color is your thing, look no further: you’ve found your mecca. But don’t be fooled — the QT isn’t all style and no substance. They have hospitality down to an art form. Warm and welcoming, the staff, dazzling in their custom retro-inspired uniforms make you feel right at home. And the lemonade stand that greets you at the entrance doesn’t hurt, either. If lemonade isn’t up your alley, that’s okay; a table of sweets in every color of the rainbow is wheeled out mid-afternoon.
I could have sat in the lobby all day and been perfectly happy. After all, it’s spacious enough to have a few dozen friends along for the ride and still have enough seating.
But best of all is the disc-covered corner which sports a cherry red espresso machine tucked inside a coffee bar on one side and a view of the pool on the other.
I was already having a design-gasm just from the grand entrance. Nothing could come close to topping the experience. Or, so I thought.
As I made my way up to my room, I cracked open the door to be met with a striped shower (!!!) in the bathroom. I felt like the QT had crawled inside my brain and secretly pulled all my favorite design elements together for my arrival. Everything was spot-on.
Kitschy barware and an in-room suite to concoct my own brew of lemonade was tucked alongside the floor-to-ceiling windows.
The bathroom featured not one but two mirrors (the more the merrier, I say).
Hung along the wall were netted beach-ready bags, perfect for shaking all the sand out of Surfers Paradise explorations.
As I sat on the bed and flipped through the menus, I realized that all the print materials were just as immaculately designed as the rooms.
A striped bedskirt?! Yes, please.
Pin-up girls covered the surfaces of menus, elevators and more. I kept this set of awesome postcards.
As we exited the QT for a bike ride along Surfer’s Paradise (they’ve thought of everything and there are a gaggle of bikes in their lobby), we were met with this vintage car in a shade of Blogcademy turquoise. It couldn’t get much more perfect than that, I thought. Little did I know that we had another QT experience waiting for us a few days later in Port Douglas…
Complimentary lemonade.
Service with a smile.
Style for days.
QT Gold Coast made a lifelong fan of me in one day flat.
Special thanks to Tourism and Events Queensland for making this post possible.
Photos: Janneke Storm and Shauna Haider.
