NoMad London is the brand's first step beyond New York, set in a Grade II listed landmark in Covent Garden, the former Bow Street Magistrates' Court and Police Station, directly opposite the Royal Opera House. The building is a piece of London's social history, having seen everything from Oscar Wilde's prosecution to the Kray twins in the dock. The transformation was led by New York design studio Roman and Williams, who worked with the building's grain rather than erasing it, threading the conversation between London and New York through every corner. Former magistrates' and clerks' offices, and even holding cells, are now warm, sunlit rooms furnished with art and objects from many eras, each one carrying its own history. The hotel has 91 rooms and 16 suites, done in the understated, residential elegance that is distinctly NoMad, most with a fireplace, a dressing table, and a fine minibar. The duplex Magistrate's Suite climbs a sweeping staircase to a bedroom with a freestanding tub, a signature NoMad touch. Nothing here still looks the way it once did, yet the past keeps breathing through it.
Dining is the soul of NoMad. Beneath a glass-roofed atrium hung with cascading plants, the signature Twenty8 NoMad feels open to the sky by day and turns intimate by night, home to the truffle-and-foie-gras roast chicken carried over from New York. Side Hustle pours Cal-Mex spirit as NoMad's take on the British pub and already sits on the World's 100 Best Bars list, while the subterranean Common Decency is a sultry, low-lit lounge. For something quieter, the residents' Library faces the Royal Opera House. The former courtroom is now the Magistrates' Ballroom, which with two private dining rooms and its own entrance makes over 800 square meters of event space, and a small museum and original cells remain onsite.
