Dakota Hotel, Manchester Airport
Delivering the Floors for the UK's First Luxury Airport Hotel
Objective
To deliver the complete flooring package to Dakota Hotels’ newest property, a 7-storey, 154 bedroom hotel on a three acre plot at MIX Manchester, working alongside main contractor GMI Construction. Dakota describes this one as the destination before the destination, a hotel designed to feel like a city centre stay rather than an airport stopover. That set the bar for the floors: every finish had to carry the brand’s understated luxury through the bar, the grill and the guestrooms, while standing up to guests arriving at every hour, wheeled luggage on every corridor and a building that never really goes quiet.
Approach
From the woven Axminster running through every bedroom and corridor to the herringbone timber in the ground floor dining area, our focus was precision in the setting out, consistency across seven storeys, and protecting what we had installed until the hotel opened.
Carpet
The largest element of the package was woven Axminster, close to 4,800 square metres of it across the guestrooms, corridors, front of house areas and lift cars.
It was installed double stick, bonded to an underlay which is itself bonded to the subfloor. The floor feels noticeably softer underfoot, absorbs sound in the corridors and bedrooms, and holds its appearance far longer under heavy trolley and luggage traffic. The guestroom and corridor carpet was cut off site and delivered ready to install, which kept waste and congestion out of a busy building, and our team handled distribution across all seven floors around the other trades still finishing their own packages.
Timber
The ground floor dining area called for more warmth and character, so we installed an engineered timber floor in a classic herringbone pattern. Herringbone shows up every imperfection beneath it, so the preparation mattered as much as the installation: a damp proof membrane and a water based levelling compound brought the substrate to the tolerance the pattern needed before any timber went down. The setting out was worked back from the room’s key sightlines so the pattern reads correctly as guests move through the space, with clean, deliberate terminations at the walls.
Vinyl
Behind the guest facing spaces sits the part of a hotel that has to work hardest. Here we installed safety vinyl with 150mm coved skirtings formed and welded throughout. Coving the vinyl up the wall removes the junction where dirt and water usually collect, giving an impervious surface that is quicker to clean and far more hygienic.
Stairs and Mat
The main stair was finished in carpet tiles taken across the lobbies and landings and continued onto the treads and risers, with nosings throughout. Every tread and riser has to be measured, cut and fitted individually, the nosings have to sit flush and true for both safety and appearance, and the finish has to read the same from the first flight to the last. Our team worked closely around the timber stringer detail installed by others so the two elements met cleanly.
At the main entrance, an aluminium matwell system with double charcoal wipers was set into a black anodised frame and backed up by natural coir matting. It captures moisture and grit at the threshold, which protects every other finish in the building, and that matters more than usual here, where guests arrive straight from a car park or a shuttle in Manchester weather.
Summary
Dakota Manchester Airport is the fifth Dakota hotel GMI Construction has delivered for Evans Property Group, and being trusted with the floors on a project of this profile was a genuine privilege. It brought together everything we do under one roof: large scale woven carpet, engineered timber, safety vinyl, carpet tiles, entrance systems, preparation and protection, all delivered to luxury hotel standards and to a tight programme. Our thanks to GMI Construction and to everyone involved for a well-run project from start to finish.
