Meet The Woman Who Designed The Coolest New Hotel In Australia
On coat hooks, bad lighting, 1970s Ibiza, and what it actually takes to make a hotel worth going back to.
There are people who make beautiful rooms and there are people who make you feel something in them. Nasim Köerting is emphatically the second kind.
She is Merivale’s first-ever Design Director – a role that didn’t exist before her. Iranian roots, a refugee story, a career forged across Israel, Spain, and London before Justin Hemmes came calling. Australia’s most culturally significant hospitality group had never had a Design Director. She’s since spent years shaping more than 90 venues into some of the most talked-about rooms in the country.
I met her at a dinner party a few years back and we never quite got over it. Something about her energy – the way she talks about spaces like they’re living things that either earn your trust or they don’t, that just makes you want to exist in her orbit.
She has become one of my people. One of that rare group of women who understands hotels the way I understand hotels. Not as places to sleep. As experiences to be felt, dissected, and passionately argued about over a second bottle of wine at 11pm even though everyone else has gone home.
We have spent more dinners than I can count talking about what makes a hotel genuinely great versus merely beautiful. She has opinions. The kind that come from someone who has stayed everywhere, and noticed everything, and has now put it into practice.
She is my first Substack interview because she is the creative force behind The Whale, Merivale’s first hotel.
John and I were some of the first media guests in. Before I tell you what we found, I went straight to the woman who built it.
Nasim Köerting, Design Director, Merivale
You’ve designed across bars, restaurants, and venues. What was the challenge in tackling a hotel?
“Designing a hotel is about the entire 24-hour guest experience. Unlike a hospitality venue, where the focus is on creating a moment in time, a hotel requires you to consider every touchpoint and how you make guests feel seen and considered throughout their stay.
That thinking shaped every detail – from the road trip down, complete with a curated playlist, to the welcome drink on arrival, and every object and interaction along the way. Designing with the full guest journey in mind was so fun and incredibly rewarding.”
What makes a hotel worth going back to and not just worth visiting once?
“Making a new hotel desirable upon opening is relatively easy compared to making it just as desirable to return. Form over function is often the killer. Justin, Bettina, the team and I are all passionate travellers, and we share an obsession with the details that make a hotel memorable.
This was the first hotel we’d designed together and that gave us the opportunity to sit down and talk about what we genuinely love about hotels, then create something truly special from those shared experiences. Every design decision was driven by one purpose to make the stay feel transportive.”
What’s the thing most hotels get wrong that drives you insane?
“Nowhere to lay out your bag. I love opening my suitcase on a proper bench or counter to rummage through, so we made sure that was there. We also made sure there was an abundance of coat hooks. It’s the little moments where form and function combine that mean the most to guests. Another pet peeve is complicated lighting. So we created three moods that adjust according to the time of day. Guests can just relax and not think about all the lights.”
This. This is why I trust her.
The 1970s Ibiza reference – where did it actually come from?
“Heavily Ibiza in the ‘70s, but we also wove in objects and materials from around the world, tiles from Japan and Portugal, art from the Pacific Islands. It became something more layered than a single reference. We wanted to remind our guests of travels they have taken from around the world. I overheard one guest say ‘This looks like Morocco!’ and I had a laugh, because everyone connects so differently with the aesthetic.”
What’s the one detail in The Whale that’s entirely yours?
“Whilst travelling to Papua New Guinea I found the most incredible woven curtaining. We collaborated with beautiful boutique artists at Bilum Bilas, who worked with a local village in PNG to weave these screens and send them over to us. It was such a special collaboration and one I’m incredibly proud of.”
Best sourcing story?
“So many pieces. A lot of the ceramics you see on the walls were sourced in European markets. A few of us from the Design Studio were lucky enough to travel over and find original, authentic pieces. There is a particular ceramic wall piece in the garden that we found in a marketplace in France. We had no idea what it was going to look like but put it up and it looks like it was made for the hotel.”
Did Narooma change what you designed, or did you come in knowing what it was going to be?
“The hotel felt like a vessel to show the world how stunning and quietly extraordinary Narooma is. We wanted The Whale to be a bridge between guests and the beautiful location – not just a place to stay, but a reason to fall in love with where it sits. We all love Narooma. It’s a second home to Justin and his family, and we want everyone to come and experience the magic.”
Convinced? Our full review is coming this weekend, including why we're already planning a return. Look out for it.
st. That bit about hotels 'as experiences to be felt, dissected, and passionately argued about over a second bottle of wine' — yes, that's the whole point!!