Hotel reviews
Hotels we have visited, ranked by Heart Score
Every hotel here was visited in person by one of our advisors. How we score.
Four Seasons Hotel Bangkok at Chao Phraya River
This is the Bangkok hotel I'd book on every trip after the first. The rooms are REALLY good, breakfast is the best in the city, and it costs about $225 a night less than the Capella next door…just know the location takes some planning.
Mandarin Oriental, Bangkok
The Mandarin Oriental Bangkok has the best hotel staff I've come across anywhere, on a bend of the Chao Phraya that none of the newer hotels can match. The rooms are handsome and on the small side, so skip the entry Deluxe and book a State Room if you can. Breakfast is a scrum and the lobby fills up with day visitors, but at about $500 to $700 a night for most of the year, it's still the hotel I'd send you to on a first trip to Bangkok.
Park Hyatt Kyoto
This is where I'd stay in Kyoto, and I wouldn't think long about it. The address on the old lanes of Higashiyama, with the Yasaka Pagoda in the window, beats every pool and spa the rivals can offer, and the staff are some of the best in Japan. It's very expensive though…and in a room without the view, you've wasted your money.
Bulgari Hotel Tokyo
Bulgari Hotel Tokyo is the most glamorous hotel in the city: a green mosaic pool 40 floors up, a bar with the Imperial Palace at sunset, and some of the warmest, sharpest service I've had anywhere in Japan. It feels more Milan than Tokyo, breakfast is the weak spot, and at about $1,400 a night you pay a lot for the name…but if you want a little Italian glamour on top of Tokyo Station, nothing else comes close.
Regent Hong Kong
The Regent is the calm one on the Kowloon waterfront, and for most trips to Hong Kong it's where I'd send you. Rooms cost about half what they do at the Rosewood next door, the staff were warmer, and from the window table in our suite I watched the Star Ferries go back and forth until the sun dropped behind IFC. There's no spa and the main pool doesn't look at the skyline. Book a Harbourview Suite for the club and the space.
Hotel The Mitsui Kyoto
Hotel The Mitsui Kyoto is the calmest luxury hotel in Kyoto, built on the old Mitsui family estate across from Nijo Castle, with a real hot spring under the garden and staff in kimono who remember everything. The rooms are understated for the price and breakfast gets busy…but if you want a quiet, beautiful place to come back to, this is it.
Palace Hotel Tokyo
Palace Hotel Tokyo is the grown-up's Tokyo hotel: a balcony over the Imperial Palace moat, a beautiful spa, some of the best service in the city and a short walk to Tokyo Station, for about $650 a night. The rooms are starting to show their age and the best restaurants are hard to book…but for the money, nothing in Tokyo does this much this well.
Rosewood Hong Kong
Rosewood Hong Kong has the best rooms in the city, 53 square metres of marble, lacquer and tartan with the whole harbour in the window, and the Manor Club on the 40th floor is the best club lounge I've used. Outside the club, though, it's a very busy hotel, and the service and breakfast downstairs don't keep up. Book a harbour room with the club, never a Kowloon Peak room, and if that's beyond the budget, take a harbour room at the Regent next door.
Four Seasons Hotel Hong Kong
Book the Four Seasons for the food and the staff, but not for the room. No hotel in Hong Kong is better for eating, with seven Michelin stars across Caprice, Lung King Heen and Noi. Our Deluxe Harbour View room was the disappointment, already looking older than its refit, with 45 square metres that filled up fast and a cramped bathroom. At close to Rosewood prices I'd book it for a work trip in Central or a trip built around food, and if you're paying mainly for the room, I'd send you across the harbour.
Four Seasons Hotel George V, Paris
The best service and the best eating of any hotel in Paris, and I don't think either is close. But at $3,000 a night it has become very hard to defend, and the lobby is full of people who came to be seen. I'd go once, for an occasion, and stay at Le Bristol the rest of the time.
Four Seasons Hotel Tokyo at Otemachi
The Four Seasons at Otemachi is the Tokyo hotel I'd book on almost any trip. You get the Imperial Palace gardens and Mount Fuji in your window, a deep soaking tub, a lovely pool and a bar that's one of the best in the city, for about half the price of the Aman next door. Breakfast can get busy and the neighbourhood is quiet at night…but it's the smartest luxury stay in Tokyo.
Bellustar Tokyo, A Pan Pacific Hotel
Bellustar Tokyo has the most dramatic night view of any hotel in Shinjuku, from a bathtub 40 floors above Kabukicho, at about half the price of the Park Hyatt. The rooms are new and beautiful, the free lounge is a lovely surprise and the sushi counter is a steal. But the service trips over itself, there's no pool, and the street below is Tokyo at its seediest…so know what you're signing up for.
Capella Singapore
Capella is the place in Singapore to do nothing at all, and I'd book it for a few slow days and little else. We slept better here than anywhere else in Singapore, the room was enormous, and Cassia was so good that we skipped a night in town for it. But you're out on Sentosa, and you'll be in a lot of taxis.
Conrad Osaka
Conrad Osaka has one of the most dramatic hotel lobbies in Japan, 40 floors up behind a wall of curved glass, and big rooms with round tubs at the window. Breakfast is great and the sushi counter is better. The service is a bit uneven and the rooms are dark…but for about $470 a night, it's one of the best-value luxury hotels in the country.
Four Seasons Hotel Kyoto
The Four Seasons Kyoto is built around an 800-year-old pond garden, and that garden is the reason to book it. Add the best hotel pool in Kyoto and a real welcome for children, and it's the Kyoto hotel I'd pick for a family. It's big, though, the rooms could be in any good hotel in Asia, and one restaurant does most of the work…for a couple on a short first trip, I'd book the Park Hyatt.
Mandarin Oriental, Tokyo
Mandarin Oriental Tokyo is the Tokyo hotel for views, food and lovely, personal service. You're on the 30th floor and up, with the Skytree outside your window and Fuji in silhouette from the lobby at sunset, and the eight-seat Pizza Bar upstairs is one of the best meals in the city. The rooms are well kept but a little plain now, there's no swimming pool, and Nihonbashi goes quiet at night. It isn't cheap, but it usually costs less than the Peninsula or the Four Seasons at Otemachi, and for the food and the night view it's the one I'd book.
Park Hyatt Niseko Hanazono
Park Hyatt Niseko is the easiest luxury ski trip in Japan: big, beautiful rooms, a ski valet that does everything but put your boots on, and a breakfast seafood bowl I'd fly back for. It's isolated, eating every meal here gets expensive, and in peak season it's over $2,000 a night and very busy…but for a ski week in Hokkaido with no hassle at all, it's the one I'd book.
The Ritz-Carlton, Osaka
The Ritz-Carlton Osaka is an English country manor on top of Umeda, with a real fireplace in the lobby, freshly renovated rooms and some of the warmest staff in Japan. The public areas feel their age and the best perks hide behind Club Level…but at about $385 a night, it's the best-value luxury hotel in Osaka.
Mandarin Oriental, Singapore
This is the hotel I'd choose for waking up on Marina Bay, and its club lounge, HAUS 65, turned out to be the best part of our stay. Book the Club room, because the lounge comes with it and makes up for a room that's fresh and pretty but compact at 34 square metres. The bigger worry is the building site full of tower cranes between the hotel and the water.
The Prince Gallery Tokyo Kioicho, a Luxury Collection Hotel
The Prince Gallery is the Tokyo hotel with the best window. Every room has a huge framed picture window with a daybed along it, the corner rooms add a deep bath right at the glass, and the quiet spa floor and Levita bar are lovely. Breakfast is the letdown, and the rooms are a little worn in places. At about the Palace Hotel's price, it's my pick for a second trip to Tokyo, when you want the view more than the address.
Raffles Singapore
Raffles is still the most beautiful hotel in Singapore, but at this price the front desk lets it down. Our Courtyard Suite, with its parlour and verandah over the palms, was a joy, and the butlers and the breakfast team were lovely too. Emails went unanswered and check-in was clumsy, so I'd book it for a first visit or a big occasion and go in knowing that.
The Ritz-Carlton, Kyoto
The Ritz-Carlton Kyoto is built along the Kamogawa, and the river and the staff are the best things about it. From a river-view room you watch half of Kyoto come down to the banks in the evening, and Pontocho is a short walk downstream. But inside it could be any good Japanese hotel, and breakfast is patchy. For about the same money, the Mitsui gives you more.
Aman Tokyo
Aman Tokyo has the most beautiful hotel room in Tokyo, and a bath with a view I still think about, but that's mostly what you're buying. The food is good without being memorable, the service is very good but not quite legendary, and the rates have roughly doubled in a few years. I'd book two nights for the room…then move to the Four Seasons down the road.
The Ritz-Carlton, Tokyo
The Ritz-Carlton Tokyo sits on the top nine floors of a tower in Roppongi, and I loved being up there, with the whole city laid out below me to the bay and staff who looked after us more warmly than at any big hotel I know in Tokyo. But the rooms are dark and dated, and they feel a decade behind the rest of Tokyo's top hotels…at about $750 a night, I'd want them redone before I paid peak rates here again.
The Peninsula Tokyo
The Peninsula Tokyo has the best address of any big luxury hotel in the city, right across the road from the Imperial Palace gardens with Ginza a few minutes' walk away, and the service is polished and quietly warm. The pool is lovely and Peninsula Time (check in at 6am, leave at 10pm) is a gift after a long flight. But the rooms haven't really changed since 2007, and you feel it. It's a hotel I like a lot, held back by rooms that badly need the renovation the owners have now approved.
Fairmont Singapore
Book the Fairmont for the room and the location, and eat breakfast somewhere else. It sits right on top of City Hall station, so you can be anywhere in Singapore in minutes, and our renovated room looked straight out over Marina Bay. Breakfast was by far the worst part of the stay.
Andaz Tokyo Toranomon Hills
Andaz Tokyo is the hotel to book for Tokyo Tower in your window and a pool, hot tubs and sauna you don't pay extra for. The room is big, with a deep round tub, but its design hasn't changed since 2014, the carpet is an odd green and the bed is firm. Breakfast is very good, dinner and the rooftop bar are only fine, and Toranomon goes dead after 8pm. I'd pick it over the Park Hyatt, and it's usually a good deal cheaper, but book it on a quiet date, because on a busy night it costs too much for what it is.
Four Seasons Hotel Singapore
The staff were lovely, and our room was bigger than any I've had in Singapore, for less than the other top hotels charge. But the hotel is tired, and outside the door it's mostly malls. I'd come back, just not on a first trip to Singapore.
Park Hyatt Tokyo
Park Hyatt Tokyo is overrated, and it trades on its name and on Lost in Translation. The renovation that finished in December 2025 left the rooms very bland, and at about $1,000 a night that isn't good enough. The real pleasures are a late evening in the New York Bar with a jazz singer in front of Shinjuku's lights, and an hour under the bamboo in the Peak Lounge…I'd go up for a drink and sleep somewhere else.
Capella Bangkok
The Capella Bangkok is small, quiet and lovely at dusk, with a wonderful bed and a lunch at Côte that's worth crossing the lawn for. It isn't the world's best hotel, though. Up close the finishes look cheap, the pool and gym are small, and at about $850 a night it isn't competitive with the Four Seasons next door, which costs about $225 less. I'd stay at the Four Seasons and walk over for lunch.
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