Jeremy King very sweetly gave me a preview of his new venture, the Beaumont Hotel, due to open some time in late September (it’s taking bookings from October 1st.).   He has acquired a lease from the Grosvenor Estate on a building just south of Oxford Street which was used as the garage for Selfridges.   He has renovated it as if it was a hotel from the 1920s, the era of prohibition.   But it’s most prominent feature is a monumental sculpture by Antony Gormley which squats on the side of the hotel and doubles as a hotel bedroom.   It’s an extraordinary room, high and dark, no television, made out of smoked oak, like spending a night inside a tomb.

This is the sculpture:

This is the room seen from the bed:

And these are the joints in the smoked oak: