Hotel Interior Design & FF&E.
Lobbies, guest rooms, and public spaces for boutique and independent properties — specified per key, imported, and installed. Showrooms in Metro Detroit. Projects nationwide. Since 1985.
What is FF&E in hospitality?
The plain answer first, then the part that makes a hotel unlike any other room we furnish.
FF&E — furniture, fixtures, and equipment — is everything in a hotel that isn't the building itself: guest-room casegoods, lobby seating, lighting, and decor. Hotel FF&E work means specifying each piece to hospitality grade, repeating it accurately across every key, and delivering it on the property's opening or renovation schedule.
Hotel interior design is the other half of that job: the lobby a guest judges the property by in eight seconds, the guest room they spend the night in, the bar, the corridors, the fitness and meeting rooms. It sits inside commercial interior design as its own discipline because no other sector has to build the same room ninety times and have every one of them look and wear identically.
Italcasa works both ends. We draw the lobby and the guest-room prototype, then supply them — direct from the Italian and European houses, imported and warehoused by us, installed floor by floor by the team that drew the plan. Design and buying under one roof is what keeps a per-key package consistent from the sample room to key 112.
What Makes Hotel Interior Design Different.
A hotel is not one room. It is a lobby that has to make a first impression and a guest room that has to be made identically dozens of times, wear for years, and be installed without emptying the property. Six constraints shape every specification we write.
- Keys
The unit of work is the key.
Every decision on a hotel package is priced, ordered, and installed per key. We build the guest-room specification as a single repeatable package, then multiply it — so a fabric upgrade or a nightstand change is costed across the whole property before anyone signs off on it.
- Repeatability
Room 214 has to match room 501.
Dye lots, wood finishes, and hardware drift between production runs. We order guest-room casegoods and upholstery in consolidated runs against one approved standard, hold attic stock where the schedule allows, and document the spec so a replacement three years out still matches the floor.
- Durability
A guest room is used harder than a home.
Casegoods get suitcases dragged across them, upholstery gets cleaned on a housekeeping schedule, and nothing gets a rest day. We specify to hospitality-grade abrasion and cleanability ratings, with edge details and finishes chosen for how they fail — and how cheaply they can be touched up.
- Brand Standards
Flagged properties come with a binder.
If the property carries a brand, the FF&E has to clear that brand's standards and the renovation has to satisfy a PIP cycle. We specify against the standard you're held to, prepare the submittals in the format the brand expects, and keep the boutique character inside the rules.
- The Lobby
The lobby is the property's first impression.
It is the one room a guest judges the rate against before they've seen anything else — and the one place a boutique property can look nothing like the chain down the road. Statement seating, a signature light, and a check-in sequence that works at 3pm rush and at 2am.
- Phasing
The property stays open.
Renovations happen around occupancy: a floor at a time, deliveries staged to a service elevator and a loading window, corridors protected, and the finished floor back in inventory before the next one comes offline. We plan the install sequence with the GM, not after them.
- Codes & Standards
What we specify against.
Every guest-room and public-space item is checked against these before the volume order is placed.
- Brand standards and PIP scope — the governing document on any flagged property
- CAL 117 flammability for upholstered seating; CAL 133 where public-assembly occupancy requires it
- NFPA 260 / 261 cigarette-ignition classification on upholstery components
- NFPA 701 flame resistance for draperies and hanging textiles
- ADA and ANSI A117.1 accessible guest rooms, clearances, and public-space routes
- Life-safety egress and occupancy load through lobby, bar, and meeting spaces
Interior Design, Specification, and Procurement Under One Roof.
Most hotel projects lose their schedule in the handoff between the designer's spec book and whoever buys from it. We do both, so what gets approved in the sample room is what arrives on every floor.
Lobby & lounge design
The arrival sequence, seating groups, check-in, and the public rooms a guest photographs — drawn and furnished as the property's signature.
Guest-room FF&E packages, per key
Casegoods, seating, upholstery, lighting, mirrors, and soft goods specified as one repeatable package and priced per key.
Restaurant & bar spaces inside the property
The F&B rooms are their own discipline, and we specify them on the same schedule as the hotel — see our restaurant and bar work
Statement lighting
The lobby's signature fixture and the decorative layers under it, specified for lamp access, maintenance reach, and the dimming curve a hotel actually runs.
Art & decor coordination
Artwork, mirrors, and accessories sourced and hung as part of the package, so the room is finished rather than furnished.
Procurement, freight & phased installation
Factory orders, ocean and domestic freight, customs, warehousing, and white-glove install with a punch list closed floor by floor.
Renovation phasing around open floors
Install sequences built around occupancy, service-elevator windows, and the room-nights the property can afford to take out of inventory.
Budget, spec, and install are all planned per key — so a change on one room is priced across the whole property before it's approved.
Built Around the Sample Room.
A hotel package is approved once and then repeated at volume, so the whole schedule pivots on one gate: the mocked-up guest room. Everything before it is specification; everything after it is logistics.
- 01Kickoff
Concept & Brand Alignment
Property positioning, guest profile, rate strategy, and — on a flagged property — the brand standard or PIP scope the package has to clear. The design direction is set against the standard, not around it.
- 02Specification
Per-Key Specification
The guest-room package specified line by line: casegoods, seating, lighting, textiles, and decor, with finish samples in hand, long-lead items flagged, and quantities built from the actual room mix rather than a round number.
- 03The gate
Sample-Room Approval
One room built out to spec and walked by ownership, operations, and housekeeping. What gets signed off here is what gets multiplied — so this is where changes are still cheap and after this they aren't.
- 04Production
Volume Ordering & Import
Consolidated factory orders placed against the approved room, dye lots and finishes held to one run, freight and customs managed, and everything staged in our warehouse until the property is ready to receive it.
- 05Install
Floor-by-Floor Delivery
Delivery and installation sequenced by floor around occupancy and the service elevator, rooms set to plan, and each floor punch-listed and back in inventory before the next one comes down.
Italian Hotel Furniture, From the Houses That Build It.
We hold direct relationships with the top Italian and European contract houses, and we specify from them by where the piece sits in the property — a lobby statement is a different problem from a casegood that repeats across every key.
Lobby & public spaces
Where the property makes its first impression.
- Moroso
Hospitality-grade statement seating with the silhouette a boutique lobby is remembered for, and frames built for public-space traffic.
- Diesel Living with Moroso
For properties whose identity leans harder than a classic lobby — industrial, characterful pieces that still carry contract construction.
- Cappellini
Design icons that give a public space a reference point, specified where a single piece has to carry the room.
Lounge & suite upholstery
The seating guests actually settle into.
- Arketipo
Deep lounge and suite upholstery in performance textiles, for club floors, suites, and the quieter corners of a lobby.
- Natuzzi Italia
Leather and fabric upholstery programs with the repeatability a multi-suite order needs and a service network behind them.
- Moooi & Foscarini
The property's signature light — Heracleum overhead in a lobby, Foscarini's decorative layers through lounges and corridors.
Guest rooms, per key
The package that repeats down every floor.
- Pianca
Guest-room casegoods, wardrobes, and nightstands in finishes that hold across production runs and touch up cleanly.
- Reflex
Tables and glass-topped pieces for suites and public rooms where a guest-room desk has to look like more than a desk.
- Sunpan
Volume-friendly guest-room seating and occasional pieces that keep a per-key budget workable without dropping to residential construction.
The Per-Key Model Travels.
A hotel package is approved once and repeated — which makes it the easiest kind of project to run remotely. We furnish properties across the country from Metro Detroit, and the only thing that changes is that the walkthroughs are on video and the samples come to you.
Video walkthrough and plan review
You walk the property on camera or send the architect's drawings and room matrix. We work from the same plan set your GC and brand manager have.
Digital specification package
Guest-room and public-space spec books, renderings, and the per-key quantity schedule delivered digitally, with revisions handled in video sessions on your time zone.
Samples shipped, sample room built locally
Finish, wood, and textile samples couriered to you for sign-off; the mock-up room is built on site from the shipped package and walked with us over video before volume release.
Freight and phased install in any state
We manage factory orders, freight, and clearance, then coordinate local white-glove installation floor by floor and walk each punch list with your PM.
Hotel Interior Design, Detroit to Ann Arbor.
Bring the floor plate and the key count into either showroom and sit in the chairs. Our contract library is on site, so a guest-room finish package can be narrowed in one afternoon instead of three rounds of shipped samples.
Hotel FF&E & design questions.
The questions owners and asset managers actually open with. If yours isn't here, ask us directly — we answer specifics, not generalities.
What is FF&E in hospitality?
FF&E — furniture, fixtures, and equipment — is everything in a hotel that isn't the building itself: guest-room casegoods, lobby seating, lighting, and decor. Hotel FF&E work means specifying each piece to hospitality grade, repeating it accurately across every key, and delivering it on the property's opening or renovation schedule. It is bought as one contract package on the construction program rather than piece by piece, and it is what separates a room that still looks right in year five from one that doesn't.
What does hotel interior design include?
For a boutique or independent property it covers the lobby and arrival sequence, guest rooms and suites, corridors, the bar and dining rooms, and the fitness and meeting spaces — space planning, finishes, lighting, and the full FF&E specification, coordinated with the architect and general contractor. On our projects it also covers the buying: procurement, import, freight, warehousing, and installation. The team that draws the guest-room prototype is the team standing on the floor when it is installed.
How do you keep furniture consistent across every room?
Per-key spec discipline. The guest room is specified once as a single repeatable package and approved in a built sample room; volume orders are then placed in consolidated runs so finishes and dye lots come from the same production, rather than being topped up months apart. Quantities are built from the real room mix — kings, doubles, accessible rooms, suites — not a round number, and we hold attic stock and a documented spec so a replacement years later still matches the floor.
Can you work within a hotel brand's standards or a PIP?
Yes. On a flagged property the brand standard is the governing document and the PIP defines the renovation scope, so we specify against both from the first meeting and prepare submittals in the format the brand's design review expects. The work inside that framework is where a property still gets its character — the standard sets performance and case-good requirements far more often than it dictates a single look.
What brands of hotel furniture do you carry?
We specify from the top Italian and European contract houses, including Moroso and Cappellini for lobby and public-space seating, Diesel Living with Moroso where a property wants a harder identity, Arketipo and Natuzzi Italia for lounge and suite upholstery, Pianca and Reflex for guest-room casegoods and tables, Sunpan for volume-friendly guest-room pieces, and Moooi and Foscarini for the signature light. Which houses we bring depends on the positioning, the key count, and the per-key budget — the selection follows the specification, not a preferred-vendor list.
Do you take hotel projects outside Michigan?
Yes. Our showrooms are in Metro Detroit and we run hospitality projects nationwide. A per-key package is well suited to remote work because it is approved once and then repeated: video walkthroughs and design sessions, a digital specification package and quantity schedule, physical finish and textile samples couriered for sign-off, a sample room built on site and reviewed with us before volume release, then import, freight, and local white-glove installation coordinated floor by floor by our team.
Let’s Design
Tell Us the Keys and the Date.
Send the key count, the floor plate, and whether this is a ground-up opening or a renovation around occupied floors. We come back with a guest-room and lobby direction and a per-key specification you can build a budget on.
- Hospitality-grade FF&E, specified per key
- Direct manufacturer sourcing and warranty
- Freight, warehousing, and phased install in-house
Detroit · Birmingham · Royal Oak · Troy · Bloomfield Hills · Ann Arbor — and hotel projects in any state.