Wales’ first contemporary art hotel ends up with Green Key

One of the finest hotels in Wales, the Twr y Felin Hotel, makes a difference on an environmental and sustainability level.

Situated in a restored and extended windmill, Twr y Felin strived to develop a sustainability policy since its opening in 2016. Located in Britain’s smallest city, the hotel provides a complete retreat for guests close to St David’s cathedral and world-class beaches. It also proposes several options to discover the surroundings of the city by bike.

Furthermore, this singular hotel is Wales’ first contemporary art hotel. During your stay, you can easily discover over 100 original artworks from Welsh, British and International artists inspired by the local area .  

This 2017-18 AA Hotel of the Year (Wales) combines art, welsh food and responsible practices. Its restaurant, Blas (“Taste” in Welsh), offers local and seasonal dishes. This practice reduces food miles since the ingredients come from the surrounding countryside and coast, permitting to reflect Welsh heart. Moreover, this two Rosette restaurant fits all dietary requirements such as vegetarian, dairy free and vegan diets.

We are delighted to be awarded the Green Key, which demonstrates our ethos of ensuring that our environmental footprint is as light as possible. We feel responsible for the impact we have on the world and are passionate about adopting initiatives that will reduce this.

– Group General Manager of Twr y Felin Hotel, Roch Castle and Penrhiw

The Twr y Felin adheres to Green Key strict criteria since it is promoting the reducing of water and energy, the use of environmentally friendly cleaning products and sustainably sourced food products. It is now a leading business in the field of environmental responsibility and has a strong desire to positively influence the direction of the tourism industry.

No doubt, this new Green Key establishment knows how to match the luxury and environmental protection.     

Morena Resort promotes alternatives to single-use plastic bottles

This summer, a water refill station has been introduced on Morena Resort, Curacao. An initiative to say goodbye to your no re-usable plastic bottles!

Morena Resort´s Water Refill Program is aligned with Morena´s desire to be recognized as an eco-resort. Indeed, this Green Key awarded establishment has been built with environmentally sustainable materials from regional fair-trade cooperatives and uses low environmental impact techniques such as solar water heater on its roofs. This new element available for the tourists is a reusable bottle called D-TAP. It has been introduced by D-Bottle, a brand promoting steel reusable bottles to reduce single-use of plastic.

Moreover, the guests have the possibility the (re)fill it at the Resort´s D-TAP water refill station or the others Curacao´s ones. A D-TAP phone App permits to find nearby Refill location. With Google maps, you can easily find clean water everywhere you go! Guests don´t have any excuses for not getting rid of their single-use plastic bottle.

Since 1,4 million tourists visit Curacao each year, having a refill station could be a great way to raise awareness about the single-use plastic´s dangers for the planet. For that, guests can purchase a special D-Bottle at the Resort´s reception, knowing that 5% of each D-TAP bottle bought will be donated to the Sea Turtle Conservation Curacao.

Over 1 million plastic bottle are purchased every minute worldwide and nearly 80% of these end up in our landfills and oceans. At this rate, the amount of single-use plastic ending up in our oceans will outweigh fish by 2050, unless we make a change.

- D-Bottle website

Macau’s first and only company reaching Green Key award

Melco Resorts & Entertainment is so far the only one company having a full Green Key awarded hotel portfolio in the Chinese town of Macau.

This summer, Altira Macau has been the latest Melco hotel being Green Key awarded. Thanks to that, the company’s five hotel properties in the city have now achieved the eco-label.

Melco Resorts & Entertainment manages to embrace a responsible development impulsing positive and sustainable changes. Through its “Above and Beyond” strategy, it aims to become one of the zero waste resorts and a circular economy leader by 2030.  This plan includes the reducing of greenhouse gas emissions and sustainable sourcing into its supply chain. For example last year, the company added sustainable sourcing guidelines for cotton, seafood and cleaning products.

“We are delighted that each of Melco’s five hotel properties in Macau have been honored with the esteemed Green Key standard, recognizing the Company’s strategic commitment to making our entertainment and luxury hospitality offerings sustainable, positive and rewarding for all those involved.”

– Mr. Lawrence Ho, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Melco Resorts & Entertainment

Moreover, the company contributes to the development of local talent by supporting personal and professional lifelong learning. As part of its “Above and Beyond” strategy, Melco sponsors learning programmes for local employees. Thanks to this sponsorship, 15 Melco employees graduated with bachelor degree last year. In total, a hundred employees benefitted from diploma programmes, the Back to School Education Program and the scholarships in 2018. Since its launched in 2010, it has offered 200 learning programmes per year.

A great initiative to shape a rising generation of hoteliers! At Melco, social and environmental issues go hand in hand.

Green Key family keeps going on in Serbia

The Hotel Zlatibor Mona, Serbia, is now part of the Green Key awarded establishments. It is the only one which received our certificate outside of the Serbian capital city, Belgrade.

As the first Serbian hotel brand, the Hotel Zlatibor Mona is a sustainable business which has succeeded in the implementation of sustainable practices that suit into Green Key criteria. This establishment focuses on social responsibility and awareness while developing eco-conscious practices to contribute to environmental protection. Since the renovation of the hotel in 2007, they never stopped acting to create an environmentally-friendly business.

"It is with great pleasure that I can say we received the “Green Key” certificate thanks to the dedication of our entire team and that all our employees have recognized the importance of the initiative and came on board of this global environmental movement."

- Ivan Vitorović, Chief Executive Officer of Mona Hotel Management

From the slow food concept of its restaurant to the use of environmentally friendly practices regarding water and energy, the Hotel Zlatibor Mona knows how to care of its guests while preserving the environment. Indeed, it contributes to the local communities’ development by the employment of locals and the offering of scholarship programs for students, providing the latter with a job after graduation.

Our national operator in Serbia highlighted the staff involved in informing the guests about the hotel´s sustainable methods. Everybody pays attention to the good understanding of the hotel´s way of thinking and course of conduct and never hesitate to explain them to the guests.

““We are very proud to be part of this positive initiative and we support this establishment in their way to become responsible to the environment and nature!” – Environmental Ambassadors for Sustainable Development Beograd / Belgrade”

 What a great example of Green Key´s aims! Creating changes in the hospitality and tourism industry requires such behaviors mobilising staffs and guests at the same time.

Solar Hotel - a green, affordable and activist hotel

Solar Hotel is a two-star budget hotel in Paris (France) with full focus on being sustainable and inclusive

Since 2009, Solar Hotel has assessed its carbon footprint and worked towards obtaining a green certification. The hotel is a member of the ATD network (French activists for sustainable tourism) and has earned numerous awards for its environmental and social practices.

The many sustainability activities of Solar Hotel include:

• Hallways, lounges and rooms are all exclusively lit by LED or fluorescent compact bulbs

• Purchase of 100% renewable energy

• Collection of rainwater to water plants, the garden and to wash the sidewalk

• No unnecessary individual packaging for the breakfast and in the bathrooms

• Eco-labelled soap and shampoo are available in dispensers

• The breakfast served is 100% organic and with 90% of the products produced in France

• Food leftovers from breakfast is reused in the mechanical composter in the garden

• The second-hand furniture in the guest rooms is regularly renovated and repaired

• Bicycles are available to hotel guests

• Hotel management students regularly visit the hotel to increase awareness of environmental issues

• The hotel supports and promotes environmental NGOs, e.g. by hosting and organising meetings and conferences

Franck Laval, owner of Solar Hotel says:

“We have for several reasons, chosen to be the first green, affordable and activist hotel: Firstly, to prove that ecology means investing, not spending; secondly, to prove that sustainable development is not exclusively reserved to those who have access to extensive information; and thirdly, to spread the word to thousands of independent hotel managers”.

Green Key present at the UK´s leading hospitality event

This September, Green Key will be present at Hotel360, the UK´s leading hospitality event dealing with the improvement of the hospitality industry. To contribute to the future of this ever-evolving industry, Green Key will be part of the “Go Green Advice Hub”, a 2019 brand new feature where visitors will be looking for solutions to build a more sustainable business.

Over two days, on the 18th and 19th of September, experts will introduce visitors to the latest innovations and talk about the future of the industry at Hotel360. This hub for hospitality innovation will connect industry´s professionals to solutions and services to make their establishments part of the leading ones.

In the years to come, the hospitality industry will have to focus on sustainability and responsibility, that is why communication about innovations is key to spread sustainable practices in this sector. After providing them with an environmental management framework, these industry´s most successful names will have to turn this knowledge into practices. For that, Green Key will help furnishing tools to help them reduce their water, energy usage and CO2 emissions.

Moreover, the desire to create a sustainable tourism industry goes hand in hand with a growing generation of eco-conscious travelers. Staff and guests also have to be aware of each establishment’s initiatives for the environment, as for Green Key awarded establishments. Being eco-labelled is a token of quality and proves that the establishment is committed to reducing its environmental impact.

“The Green Key team are really excited to share with visitors to Hotel360 the simple but effective actions they can take to make their hotel more environmentally friendly and how to work towards the Green Key award.”

- Emma Whitlock, Green Key Development Manager at Keep Britain Tidy

Green Key is delighted to be part of the eco-experts who will help and advise establishments in their transition. The participation in Hotel360 aims at training environmental conscious hospitality leaders who will put the development of green and responsible establishments at the top of their projects.

You can already visit hotel360.co.uk to secure your free ticket and be sure to meet our Green Key eco-experts!

Put yourself into the shoes of a plastic bag

The Green Key awarded Kamp Kovačine raises children´s environmental consciousness with interactive theatre pieces. While learning about environmental issues such as plastic pollution or the protection of species, children can express their creativity and understand their key role in protecting the environment.

Last year, Kamp Kovačine´s Eco-Theatre was about plastics, micro plastics, clean or dirty beaches. The animators of the campsite were dressed like dolphins, flowers or birds who were threatened by a plastic bag. During the piece, children had the opportunity to save the species with the help of “decision cards” so that they could become conscious of their possibilities to repair and change the world. In reaction to this “life of a plastic bag” theatre piece, animators have seen sad and angry children wanting to save animators dressed like animals or plants. It helped the children identify with nature and perceive what it is actually going through with plastic pollution and climate change.

Changing people’s behavior about our environment is not simple. Thanks to this initiative inspired by psychology class, children start caring about what they are learning. These feelings will guide childrens´ behavior their entire life and will permit them being emotionally connected to ecology. Creating these memories now is helping them understanding that each action (or inaction) matters.

“We wanted them to feel that they are not just passive individuals to whom everything is just helplessly happening. We wanted them to feel they have to be active in order to repair, to change the world”, according to Kamp Kovačine´s quality manager, Tina Gams-Fučić

In addition to the theatre piece, the animators showed a documentary about plastic waste afterwards and invited the children and their parents to discuss the topic further. At the end, each child got a bag made of recycled material from Kamp Kovačine to start their new life as small environmental ambassadors. The Eco-Theatre was so successful that the campsite decided to repeat this activity in the following seasons.

 Kamp Kovačine´s Eco-Theatre plays a key role in involving guests in and raising their awareness about the campsite’s environmental policy. This Green Key and Blue Flag awarded establishment contributes to the prevention of climate change by educating children, showing them that they can and, most of all, have to be active for our environment. It also permits interactions between generations, as kids can talk about this theatre piece with their parents, family and friends.

Noot Nordik Kitchen leveling up the game against food waste

The restaurant Noot Nordik Kitchen in the Green Key awarded Radisson Blu Scandinavia Hotel, Gothenburg is taking the fight against food waste to another level.

© Noot Nordik Kitchen

Food waste is one of the biggest challenges in hospitality industry and more and more restaurants and hotels try to level up their initiatives to reduce the amount of unused products and leftovers. The most common strategies to minimise food waste is monitoring, diligent planning of the purchases and meals as well as optimising the storage of the products to extend their shelf life.

The Noot Nordik Kitchen, however, is putting an extra effort on reducing their waste that is produced in the kitchen. They use every last piece of a vegetable or a fruit, turning carrot tops into pesto, lemon peel into both a lemon peel syrup for cocktails, a candied lemon peel for desserts and cocktails or as freshly grated flavoring to a cake. Any tops, peels, pumped corners or cut offs go in to making broths for sauces.

They use fresh, locally grown raspberries to infuse an OP Andersson Aquavit (local to Gothenburg) for their cocktails, the berries left after the infusion gets dried and crushed into a powder we use do decorate cocktails and desserts.

Bread that has gone stale become croutons. Fresh herbs that’s looking a bit sad becomes herb butter. Any ingredients left over from their daily lunches gets new life in a salad, a soup, a stew or are served as a topping on a traditional Danish Smørrebrød. In addition, “ugly” and often discarded vegetables are purchased and given a new life in their perfectly composed dishes.

Sofia Roos, restaurant manager at Noot Nordik Kitchen:

"At Noot we love every crooked carrot, every single potato and all ugly peas. They are the soul of our food philosophy. All we want is to create delicious, tasty and climate-smart dishes without crossing it too much.”

© Noot Nordik Kitchen

.Noot Nordik Kitchen does not only fight against food waste but another cornerstone of the restaurant is to buy as local and sustainable as possible. The fish is local and sustainably caught, they always favour locally grown greens and fruits and they bake their own bread and knead their on pastry for cakes and desserts. They support brewers of all sizes across the Nordic countries so that their guests can enjoy a diverse range of real ales, IPAs, APAs, lagers and stouts. On top of that, they only serve Swedish, organic sodas, there is simply no Cola-Cola in their fridges, but a local and natural Cola Blanco from Dirty Fox Water Brewery in Norrköping.

On their mission to be a front-runner in sustainability, this summer they also joint forces with “Fredagspizza”, a food concept started through the initiative Swedish Food Challenge with the aim of spreading knowledge about and increasing the use of Swedish raw materials in everyday life. Fredags.se works with consciously selected raw materials and places great focus on what we can produce where we live, more specifically in Sweden and the Nordic countries.

On July 15-20 you can visit Noot Nordik Kitchen, where they offer four variants of Swedish pizza with different topping such as lard, fresh potatoes, meatballs and air-dried elk. There are plans for a continuation for this Autumn.

© Noot Nordik Kitchen

Apitherapy and relaxation in pure nature

Green Key awarded Želinc Tourist Farm from Slovenia is offering its guests a proximity to nature, locally produced food and healing through ‘apitherapy’

Želinc Tourist Farm is situated at the confluence of the Cerknica and Idrijca rivers, with a vast plain stretching at a distance just perfect to get away from the city noise and embark on an outdoor adventure.

The first known written records of the farm date back to the end of the 14th century. The farm was passed from one generation to another. It was basically self-sufficient, while any surplus was sold to buy fabric and sugar in particular. During World Wars I and II, the farm remained intact thanks to its strategically important military location. In 1995, the farm was renovated and a new building was built to provide for tourist activity. The tourist offer has expanded over the years, therewith changing and further complementing the image of the farm.

Urša, the present owner of the farm, states:

With the new generation of farm owners, the real estate expanded in terms of farming and tourism, and became even more connected with nature and environment. On our farm we produce fruit and vegetables without the use of pesticides and artificial fertilizers, and a large part of the food that our guests receive on our plates are produced with our hands. What we do not have, we buy mostly from neighboring farms or local shops. We care for our surrounding nature, and we regularly maintain it to keep the balance and give us the necessary raw materials for heating the house with wood. As we have our own source of water, we encourage our guests not to buy bottled water but to drink our water from the tap.

The farm has a special walking path around the property with beautiful views on surrounding hilltops, and the farm also offers a possibility for healing with beehive air and other bee products such as honey, pollen and honey liquer, called 'apitherapy'.

Guests of the Želinc tourist farm can be accommodated in 14 different spacious rooms that fully meet the requirements of the Green Key programme.  

Urša concludes:

Because we are lucky enough to be able to live in a nature with clean air, beautiful green surroundings, and because we respect and care about our nature, we decided to acquire the Green Key eco-label, and thus demonstrate to ourselves, our guests and others that we are on the right track.

 For more information about Želinc tourist farm, please visit https://www.zelinc.com.