From the moment you walk through the doors to the moment you check out, your time and presence are considered precious at Island Shangri-La in Hong Kong. You’ll be greeted by exceptionally friendly guest relations staff that quickly catch onto your personal tastes and greet you by name. As you mop your brow with the hot towel and sip Chinese tea served in-room, you quickly realise you’re in excellent hands. You’ll also notice a deliciously serene scent as you move around the public areas – it was created especially for the hotel - suffused with delicate notes of ginger, bergamot, woods and vanilla.
From the impressive entrance, guests can take the lift to level 39 and change to the bubble lift to view the world’s largest Chinese silk painting, the Great Motherland of China, hanging 51 metres into an atrium. There are more than 771 chandeliers throughout the hotel, including one in every guest room. All the rooms and suites are extremely spacious, fitted with beautiful Chinese antique furnishings and boast incredible views of the city and Victoria Harbour or Victoria Peak. There are lovely touches everywhere - L’Occitane toiletries in the guestrooms and Bvlgari in the suites. Every bathroom is fitted with a television and the beds and pillows are superbly crisp and plump -the linen comes courtesy of Frette- and you’ll sleep like a baby. The breakfast buffet at cafe TOO is largely recognized as being the best anywhere in the world with its top quality service and the freshest foods that cover a great range of world cuisines including Japanese and traditional Chinese.
The Lobby lounge is great to sit in even as a solo traveller. Every day between 3 and 7pm a music quartet entertains guests and you can have a bite to eat while you watch them perform. Choose any national newspaper to catch up on world events or make the most of the free Wi-Fi available throughout the entire hotel, in the hotel’s fleet of limousines for those lucky enough to enjoy the chauffeur service, as well in the rooftop Horizon Club. This state-of-the-art exclusive lounge is ideal for business travelers seeking peace as they contemplate the Hong Kong skyline and there’s a 24-hour health club to keep up the fitness regime. As you order round-the-clock room service you can’t help thinking that mysterious perfumer managed to capture the very soul of this hotel as its scent and memories linger on…