A much-loved landmark in the heart of Leeds since 1899, The Met Hotel is one of Yorkshire's most iconic hospitality venues. Housed within a Grade II listed building renowned for its distinctive Victorian terracotta façade and stone cupola, the hotel offers 125 contemporary bedrooms, Gott's Bar & Kitchen, and extensive meeting and events facilities — including the 250-capacity Met Ballroom. Managed by RBH Hospitality Management, The Met Hotel blends its historic Victorian architecture with a modern, design-led guest experience — and needed a connectivity partner capable of delivering today's digital standards without compromising the integrity of the building.
// THE BUSINESS CHALLENGE
Modernising Connectivity in a Historic Environment
As guest expectations continue to evolve, seamless connectivity and a "home-from-home" digital experience — including the ability to stream personal content directly in-room — have become non-negotiable. The Met Hotel needed to elevate its in-room technology to match its contemporary positioning, whilst supporting a busy events and conferencing calendar that regularly fills the Met Ballroom to capacity.
The hotel's Grade II listed status and thick Victorian infrastructure presented a significant technical challenge. Heavy masonry and historic walls create substantial signal attenuation, making reliable coverage difficult without specialist design. The goal was to deploy a robust, high-speed network capable of supporting high-bandwidth services — including HD streaming, casting, and IPTV — without disrupting the property's aesthetic or historic fabric.
// A TAILORED CONNECTIVITY SOLUTION
A Collaborative Approach: Wifirst & Airwave
To deliver a truly future-proof solution, Wifirst partnered with Airwave, the UK's leading supplier of hotel TV systems. This collaboration ensured that the underlying network infrastructure and the guest-facing entertainment technology worked in perfect harmony — with Wifirst providing the connectivity backbone and Airwave delivering the in-room entertainment layer on top.
A Connectivity Backbone
Wifirst deployed a fully managed WiFi engineered specifically for the demands of a heritage hospitality environment, with professional-grade access points strategically positioned to deliver high-density coverage and full signal penetration through the hotel's heavy Victorian masonry, eliminating dead zones across guest rooms, public areas, and large ballroom event spaces, while providing robust bandwidth capable of supporting modern streaming services and simultaneous high-density event usage with consistently low latency for every guest and delegate.
Converged Infrastructure
Rather than layering multiple networks on top of one another, Wifirst's solution acts as a single digital highway for the entire hotel — supporting guest internet access, staff operations, POS systems, and the critical back-end traffic for Airwave's IPTV and casting systems over one unified infrastructure.
The Entertainment Layer
Leveraging Wifirst's robust network, Airwave installed 125 LG UR762H Series hospitality TVs — flat-to-wall mounted to respect the contemporary room design — alongside an EasyStream IPTV headend that distributes live channels and on-demand content over the IP network, removing the need for cluttering set-top boxes. The Uniguest Hub platform serves as the guest-facing interface, transforming each television into a branded, interactive portal with intuitive access to property information, Chromecast, an electronic programme guide, and the Airtime VOD library of early-release movies. Guests can seamlessly cast their own Netflix, YouTube, or other content straight from their personal devices — no cables, no complexity.
// A SEAMLESS DIGITAL GUEST JOURNEY
Setting a New Standard for Heritage Hospitality
The synergy between Wifirst's infrastructure and Airwave's entertainment solutions has transformed the guest experience at The Met Hotel by delivering invisible, home-like connectivity and significant operational efficiencies: the solution works in the background to allow guests to connect their devices and cast content instantly with no complex login procedures, buffering, or friction, while a centralised, cloud-managed infrastructure eliminates manual maintenance of in-room hardware, with Wifirst monitoring the network 24/7 to ensure uptime and resolve issues remotely, often before the hotel team is even aware of them.
Preserved Heritage
The installation was completed with minimal disruption to the historic building, proving that heritage properties can deliver cutting-edge digital standards without compromising their architectural integrity.
Key Figures
- 125 guest rooms fully connected
- 100% WiFi coverage across public areas and bedrooms
- 1 converged network supporting voice, data, and video
