Covent Garden Hotel

Covent Garden Hotel sits on the cobbled corner of Monmouth Street in Seven Dials, a converted French hospital and dispensary that Tim and Kit Kemp opened as a 58-bedroom hotel in 1996. Kit Kemp's interiors set the tone throughout: bold florals and ikat weaves, wood panelling rescued from a Welsh mansion, a first-floor drawing room hung with antique oils, and the bronze whippet that guards the panelled reception. It reads as a private house in the middle of the West End rather than a hotel lobby, five minutes from the Royal Opera House and the theatres its event rooms are named after.

The ground floor belongs to Brasserie Max, a buzzy all-day room of round tables, framed pictures and a pewter-topped bar set beneath a large arched window, where the kitchen runs brasserie classics and modern European plates and the bar keeps a long Martini list. Below it, two interconnecting private rooms, Fortune and Lyric, open onto a small light well through full-length French doors; conjoined they take 48 seated or 70 standing, and each works as a private dining room, boardroom or reception space. A 40-seat screening room with leather Poltrona Frau seats and cinema-grade projection and sound handles media launches, presentations and the hotel's weekend film club.

Upstairs, the wood-panelled Drawing Room and the smaller Tiffany's Library, with its honesty bar and stone fireplace, give the hotel two intimate lounge spaces for smaller gatherings. The combination of a self-contained screening room, a flexible pair of lower-ground rooms and a characterful main brasserie makes the hotel well suited to launches, celebrations and private dinners with a DJ in the heart of theatreland. Private events are handled by the Firmdale events team at events@firmdale.com.