Japan made them famous in the 1960s, South Korea has been marketing the concept for years and now Taiwan is designing some of the most luxurious love hotels in the business. In the last five-years, they have transformed their dated image of sleazy, windowless rooms into a multi-billion dollar industry.
"It is no longer necessary for lovers to resort to cheap or dirty rooms when they want to spend a few hours alone," said WeGo Taipei manager Henry Bai (
WeGo Motel (
PHOTOS COURTESTY OF WEGO
"We don't want to convey a sex hotel image, so we don't put much sex equipment [paraphernalia] in the rooms. We are branding the love motel concept, with an emphasis on style and luxury," Bai said.
LOVE AND RIVALRY
Riding on the success of WeGo's hedonist paradise are a growing number of love villas in Taichung, and Kaohsiung, which boast larger, more extravagant rooms. One of the latest and most upscale additions to the market is Mulan Motel (
PHOTOS COURTESY OF IMORE
The high price of land in Taipei has kept WeGo's competitors to a minimum. On a similar sized plot of land, I MORE Motel (
Opened in December last year, I MORE's rooms are clearly bigger than those at WeGo, but use the same theme-style approach in their interior decoration. In addition to the queen-sized bedroom furniture is a variety of recreational equipment from big screen TV's (often more than one) and karaoke to rooms fitted with a private pool. Bathrooms are the main attraction, however, with a sauna, shower and party-sized hot tub in every room. The major difference between the two motels is I MORE's emphasis on sex with its sex-toy slot machines and selection of imported mechanical sex chairs. The motel also hired two actors to demonstrate 48 positions for an instructional program that plays on one of the many available adult channels.
Clients range in age from 25 to 50, but despite the queue of luxury sedans driving in, rooms are not always occupied by the wealthy.
"Maybe they are not rich, but they will spend the money on a motel, because for a short time they can be treated and pretend like they are rich," said I MORE marketing manager Kyle Lai (
Wealthy or not, those dreams come with a hefty price tag.
A two hour "rest" at either motel can cost upward of NT$2,500, or NT$6,800 for 12 hours. For a large number of couples, however, it remains a small price to pay. An average day at WeGo Taipei sees 500 couples, which even at the least expensive rate of NT$1,500, translates as NT$750,000 per day. Weekends and rainy days draw an even larger turnover resulting in a queue of cars waiting three to four hours, Bai said. Both have overfill parking lots for patrons willing to wait it out.
CLEANING UP
Once inside guests are treated with superior service. Both WeGo and I MORE have ISO 9001 certification, which assumes an international standard of quality in the hospitality industry. Cleaning procedures demand three housekeepers to clean one room, which is inspected prior to being rented out. Both motels claimed housekeepers spend 20 to 30 minutes per room. Bathrooms and bedrooms are also stocked with a wide selection of toiletries and confectioneries that compare, if not exceed in quantity, those found in a five-star hotel. Despite the comparable room prices and standards to fashionable business hotels, love motels are for couples only. No more and no less than two people are permitted in a room at one time, and no entrance is permitted to anyone below18 years of age.
Love motels, new and old, are viewed as models of discretion, according to Lai, who assures anonymity and said guests rarely see the staff.
Normally, a receptionist sits in a booth at the entrance of the building greeting drivers and directing them to a room. A garage door automatically opens and closes once the car enters. Any room service is delivered to a special area outside the door, after which the wait staff leaves and notifies the guests by telephone that the food has arrived. I MORE has a separate hallway accessible only to the housekeeping "or guests in need of an escape route," Lai said.
WeGo doesn't have a secret passageway but it does have a pre-recorded soundtrack device that, with a a flick of the remote, will reproduce the background noise heard at a MRT station, beach or office when making a phone call.
Designed for love, the motels are setting hospitality standards. "Romance motels are designing some of the most luxurious, high-tech rooms in the country," Lai said.
In the March 9 edition of the Taipei Times a piece by Ninon Godefroy ran with the headine “The quiet, gentle rhythm of Taiwan.” It started with the line “Taiwan is a small, humble place. There is no Eiffel Tower, no pyramids — no singular attraction that draws the world’s attention.” I laughed out loud at that. This was out of no disrespect for the author or the piece, which made some interesting analogies and good points about how both Din Tai Fung’s and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) meticulous attention to detail and quality are not quite up to
April 21 to April 27 Hsieh Er’s (謝娥) political fortunes were rising fast after she got out of jail and joined the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) in December 1945. Not only did she hold key positions in various committees, she was elected the only woman on the Taipei City Council and headed to Nanjing in 1946 as the sole Taiwanese female representative to the National Constituent Assembly. With the support of first lady Soong May-ling (宋美齡), she started the Taipei Women’s Association and Taiwan Provincial Women’s Association, where she
It is one of the more remarkable facts of Taiwan history that it was never occupied or claimed by any of the numerous kingdoms of southern China — Han or otherwise — that lay just across the water from it. None of their brilliant ministers ever discovered that Taiwan was a “core interest” of the state whose annexation was “inevitable.” As Paul Kua notes in an excellent monograph laying out how the Portuguese gave Taiwan the name “Formosa,” the first Europeans to express an interest in occupying Taiwan were the Spanish. Tonio Andrade in his seminal work, How Taiwan Became Chinese,
Mongolian influencer Anudari Daarya looks effortlessly glamorous and carefree in her social media posts — but the classically trained pianist’s road to acceptance as a transgender artist has been anything but easy. She is one of a growing number of Mongolian LGBTQ youth challenging stereotypes and fighting for acceptance through media representation in the socially conservative country. LGBTQ Mongolians often hide their identities from their employers and colleagues for fear of discrimination, with a survey by the non-profit LGBT Centre Mongolia showing that only 20 percent of people felt comfortable coming out at work. Daarya, 25, said she has faced discrimination since she
RSS