Sol Melia, one of the largest hotel groups based in Spain, has just announced the expansion of their brand Innside by Meliá into the domestic market in Spain with the incorporation of a new hotel in Barcelona. Up until now the Innside Melía brand has been restricted to the German market and currently the group has ten hotels in that country operating in six towns, including Berlin, Munich and Dusseldorf. The hotels have a young, urban and avant-garde feel and the new hotel in Barcelona will be the first to open outside Germany.

The Innside Barcelona will open in 2011 and will join the portfolio of the company in Spain operated under its leasing formula. The hotel has been conceived as a product to acommodate guests whose stays in Barcelona are slightly longer than normal. To satisfy this demand the hotel will have 100 spacious apartments from 60 to 160 square meters in size. The building will have 19 floors designed by renowned architect Oriol Bohigas. It will be located in the Plaza de Europa in L’Hospitalet de Llobregat, the new commercial, residential and economic development in the southern part of Barcelona, near the airport and the Fira de Barcelona, one of the city’s main exhibition centers.

33 of the one hundred apartments in the new hotel will be one-room studios, 54 two-bedroom De Luxe apartments, 10 three-bedroom Suites and 3 four-bedroom Grand Luxe Suites.  The hotel will also have a restaurant, a panoramic roof swimming pool and a Fitness Centre on the 9th floor.

The brand Innside became part of Sol Meliá in 2007, adding to the portfolio of the company a number of urban and avant-garde hotels. Innside Hotels have a modern and futuristic orientation, and they are planning an ambitious expansion programme into several more European countries apart from Spain and Germany.