Striking Hobart stay takes inspiration from its chilly neighbour

Hobart has a long and storied connection to its chilly southern neighbour,Antarctica. It was from the Tasmanian capital that Roald Amundsen dispatched word of his success in the race to become the first person to reach the South Pole in 1912. The Australian Antarctic Division is based in Hobart’s southern suburbs,Antarctic sculptures dot the city’s shores,and a replica of Mawson’s Huts on Commonwealth Bay sits at the edge of the docks.

Behind the windows of a red-brick hotel on one of the city’s busiest junctions,there’s now another ode to Antarctica in the frosty tones of the Polaire Suite. Harking to another place – in this case,the Southern Ocean’s subantarctic islands – the large suite is an unexpected find inside Hobart’s near-century-old former telephone exchange.

Sharing the building (and reception) with the simpler Mantra One Sandy Bay Road,the suite is indistinguishable – just another door along the corridor – until you step inside and the 70-square-metre room opens out like a glacial expanse.

Walking a fine line between austere and cool,the one-bedroom Polaire Suite has a sparse beauty that’s deliberate,with the stone-grey tiles,polar colours,metal-framed lounge chairs and marine-grade steel dining table reflecting the tundra-like bareness of the subantarctic. And yet things are infinitely more comfortable here than life on the ice.

A partitioned bedroom beside the entrance hall features a king bed and artwork by Tasmanian painter Elaine Green,beside a bathroom with a walk-in rain shower. The expansive open-plan living area has a fully equipped chef’s kitchen with large pyrolytic oven,love seats around the dining table,and a basket of throw rugs from Launceston’s Waverley Mills,the oldest woollen mill in the country. Mornings wake to sunlight bouncing into the living area,reflected off the walls and windows of Hobart’s city buildings.

The stark aesthetic is the hallmark of its designers and creators,Louise Radman and Nav Singh,the wife-and-husband team who brought the suite’s sister restaurant-wine bar,Institut Polaire,to Hobart five years ago.

Embracing climates even brisker than Hobart’s,Institut Polaire (to which Polaire Suite guests have priority booking access) is a place of cold marble and grey leather,designed to celebrate the city’s role as a gateway to Antarctica. Serving a seasonal set menu and a walk-in-only à la carte menu,the near-waterfront Institut was awarded Australia’s best small wine list at Australia’s Wine List of the Year Awards in 2019 (and was again a finalist in 2022). Fitting to the décor,it champions cool-climate wines and spirits,from Nordic whisky and alpine amaro to Institut Polaire’s own Süd Polaire Antarctic Dry Gin and Domaine Simha wines,made by Singh and having been served at the likes of Attica and Dinner by Heston Blumenthal.

This same Antarctic Dry Gin,with Sodasmith Tasmanian tonic water,also awaits guests on arrival at the Polaire Suite,which is a five-minute walk from Institut Polaire across St David’s Park. This central park,right beside the suite,was home to Tasmania’s first European burial ground (and is still filled with gravestones and memorials) and was once proposed as the site for a city zoo.

The twin themes of the suite are polar places and design style,as reflected in its carefully chosen book collection:Shackleton,Scott,Mawson and the localised touch of the lost Northwest Passage expedition of Sir John Franklin,the one-time governor of Tasmania,on one side,and Peggy Guggenheim and Coco Chanel on the other.

The books are an invitation to linger (even if the two metal lounge chairs,in place of a sofa,don’t exactly invite couples coupling),but the city immediately outside is also a call to explore,befitting this suite with its tales of exploration. Salamanca and Constitution Dock are just a few minutes’ walk away,and the city centre rolls right up to the front door. Davey Street,immediately beneath the suite windows,is the beginning of the near-mandatory journey from the city to the summit of kunanyi/Mount Wellington.

It’s the perfect city base,and a literal cool wind that’s blown through Hobart’s accommodation offerings.

THE DETAILS

Fly

Qantas and Virgin Australia fly direct to Hobart from Sydney and Melbourne. See qantas.com; virginaustralia.com

Stay

A night at the Polaire Suite costs from $400. Seeinstitutpolaire.com.au

More

Seediscovertasmania.com

The writer stayed as a guest of Polaire Suite.