Spend a night at the French hamster hotel

Here's a story that might have passed you by: the opening recently of a so-called "hamster villa" in the French city of Nantes.

For an introductory offer of just €99 a night guests can enjoy the experience of what it's like to live like a hamster.

That means they can run themselves breathless in a giant wheel getting nowhere quickly, eat organic grains (yum yum) and drink water from a specially made fountain, all the time wearing special hamster hoods - should they so wish.



The creators of the full-on hamster "experience" are interior designer Frédéric Tabary and set designer Yann Falquerho and the idea is, according to Tabary, "to give people the real feeling of what it's like to be a hamster."

"They're are supposed to come here for fun and to mess around," he says.

"We want them to smile and relax from a society which is often so rigid."

The room currently comes equipped with a conventional shower, a bed and even a most unhamster-like microwave oven, and there are plans to provide a Wifi connection and squeeze a flat screen TV into the 18 square metre space.

And why a hamster house? Well it's something of a personal childhood thing if Falquerho is to be believed.

"When I was small I had a real passion for hamsters and I was never allowed one," he says.

"Now I'm getting my chance."

The pair are no strangers to what even they admit is the slightly bizarre, although another room in Nantes they currently rent out is perhaps a little less strange in that the decor of "Captain Nemo's hut" is inspired by French novelist Jules Verne's fictional character of the same name.

But their next concept promises to make the hamster villa look positively "normal" in comparison, as Tabary says they're currently in discussion with investors for a project which will give people the sensation of "sleeping in their mother's womb."

Enough said perhaps.