Hotel chains catch up to more adventurous spirits.

It's not all about comfort anymore. As the hotel industry is facing growing pains with the emergence of boutique hotels, larger chains are trying to catch up by redesigning their properties to fit the tastes of younger, hipper crowds.

In the past month alone, the Hyatt Corporation, Marriott Hotels and the owners of Ritz Carlton announced the launching of new brands, complete with location-specific designs, more welcoming public areas, updated room layouts and an abundance of technological wizardry to allow people to use their laptops, cell phones and digital cameras during their stay.

According to Stephanie Hampton, a spokesperson for Marriott, the hotel chain wanted to establish greater appeal to its most valuable customers--sophisticated, technologically savvy people in their 30's and 40's.

"Our target customer is around 42 years old, he's the business traveler, and Generation X-ers are starting to enter that demographic," Hampton explained. "We wanted the room to have very clean lines, not a lot of clutter, and of course, the business technology."

The new Marriott rooms will have rich wood interiors, granite bathroom countertops, ergonomic chairs and desks that will swivel out, allowing guests to connect their digital devices to the hotel's computer panel.

In addition, both Marriott and Hyatt are rethinking their public areas, devoting more attention to spaces like sushi bars and coffee shops, where people can socialize at night.

"Most hotel operators are trying to find an angle, a new style or gimmick that will attract people to their hotels," says Gerry Vasisko, of architecture firm Gruzen Samton. "It's just these whole thing of boutique hotels that have really nice, well-designed lobbies and bars that in the evening become nightclubs. They attract a lot of young people."

According to Vasisko, who has done work on several New York-based hotels, interior designers might use unusual lighting and seating arrangements to make people want to linger in the public areas.

"It's all about lots of seating, low lighting, lots of nooks and crannies where people can gather and have drinks, as well as get on their laptops," Vasisko explains. "That makes the lobby the place to be."

Vasisko also points out that the hotel rooms themselves are getting away from the purely functional layout. Now, operators are more likely to institute touches such as unusual pillow arrangements, fresh flowers and live goldfish.

"I don't think they necessarily have to be large luxurious rooms, but they can be designed in a unique way, where they are always custom-fitting the person with the environment," he explains. "It speaks to a hip New York lifestyle or a hip Chicago lifestyle."

Another architect, Steven Kratchman of Steven Kratchman Architects PC, has also noticed that hotels are more likely to adopt a particular style now, as opposed to being very traditional. Kratchman has recently completed a survey of boutique hotels in New York City in order to get ideas for a dormitory project he's working on, and was very impressed by the innovations in interior design.

"There is often a whole sequence of spaces--from the front door to the elevator, between the elevator and the lobby--where the graphics are all dark or black, and then you open the door to your room and you are impressed by the [light] contrast. They also try to break down walls--privacy is created between one guest and another by just using frosted glass or movable drapes. And walking into the room, it's very richly decorated, sometimes there is antique furniture, they use silver and stainless steel materials, everything is custom-designed."

"The Marriotts, the Hyatts--their appeal is to the businessmen, it's the appeal to everybody," he explains. "The boutique hotels go in the totally opposite direction--they try to be as specific and culturally-different as possible. They try to recreate the feel of Morocco or of some other exotic place. And I assume that the larger hotel chains see the business moving to the boutiques and they are trying to find out what the attraction is."

Not that anyone expects the traditional Marriott guest room to go out of style.

"As many people as there are in the world, there are as many tastes. Some people enjoy an adventure and to them the boutique hotel is an interesting and exciting thing," Vasisko says. "Some people want comfort and the standard room is their choice."