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| Crockfords Sentosa/ photo: Verghese |
TAXI DRIVERS in Singapore have a certain way about them, the way that glides straight past your frantically waving arm to the pretty lady 100 yards down the road. If you are lucky enough to step inside one of these rare beasts, you may experience the eerie sense that someone is listening in. We got a fright when our mouse-silent driver piped up to suggest that Singapore men were by far the more handsome pick if it came down to a choice between Singapore and Hong Kong testosterone. I laughed and pondered whether my articulate English-speaking cabbie was actually a fearsome secret agent in drab disguise.
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“And when were you last in Singapore?” Ever-smiling doormen assail you with this but there is no right answer. You could say you had been there last Thursday and it would still be too long ago. The place is one huge, meticulously managed bed-and-breakfast charged by the concern that, should you really need to leave, you must return as soon as possible.
At the higher end of the Singapore business hotels market there is a rich and expensive selection of properties. Each one individual and distinct, from its architecture to its innards, and some best described as high camp. But fun. Set to throw open their doors in 2010 and beyond are the large IRs (Integrated Resorts) in the Marina area and Sentosa Island. A few thousand luxury rooms flooding the market in these recessionary times is a prospect to turn any hotelier’s face sheet-white but business traveller cheeks are acquiring that warm accountant-friendly glow, not seen for a while in these parts. Bargains are back if you know where to look.
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| Goodwood Park/ photo: Verghese |
Budget, or business, we made every attempt to see each hotel’s regular and least expensive room – only occasionally was the Presidential Suite the sole viewing option. Show us those and we’d never leave. Guest room prices quoted in Fast Facts, at the end of this Singapore hotel review, are the best available mid-week Internet rates, very much subject to seasonal and daily fluctuations.
Singapore business hotels in the Orchard Road area
At over a hundred years old, the Goodwood Park Hotel, at 22 Scotts Road, is one of a clutch of hotels set around the Orchard Road area, the “Oxford Street” of Singapore. Other clusters are to the east, around the Marina Centre and Beach Road, and to the south, covering the central business district (CBD) and Chinatown. But on with our Goodwood Park Hotel review. Built as a German Club in 1912 and almost immediately confiscated in 1914, the Goodwood Park’s original design, after a Rhineland castle, explains its distinctive centre tower. Nowhere else does it rise above three storeys. The hotel still feels somewhere between a hill station club and a pukkah cricket pavilion – a perfect escape.
Guest rooms still have small pane windows that you can open outwards. A standard room has a club armchair and footstool where you could imagine a great aunt sitting and fretting over where the syce had got to with the car. There is a sofa, ceiling fan, pleasing back lighting, light pastel décor, a big desk with Broadband connection, an Elf safe and in-room tea and coffee. The rooms are big but the bathrooms are a more average fit with an in-the-bath shower. Attached to the main building is the Mayfair court, with more contemporary suites of shaded rooms round a Bali-style swimming pool. The hotel’s afternoon tea remains one of the city’s favourites, especially with the Japanese. Along the corridor to the coffee shop, where American breakfast aromas waft, there is still an embedded Indian tailor.
Just behind the Goodwood Park is The Elizabeth Hotel, a centrally located Singapore business hotel that is neat, contemporary, comfortable and economical, without excessive frills and flash. The Elizabeth is a short hop from Orchard Road and set just away from the bustle.
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| Sheraton Towers: Executives' dream |
For something entirely different, further up Scotts Road is the crisp doyen of Singapore business hotels, the Sheraton Towers Singapore, with 412 rooms including 23 theme suites. The place has long been a favourite with executive travellers and offers an arsenal of goodies to please the most hardboiled customer. The marble and glass Valhalla lobby is a good introduction to Singapore’s penchant for cathedral entrances. Another feature, typical of local hotel architecture, is the highway-wide sweeping carpeted staircase down from the mezzanine floor.
My visit started off with a courteous approach by the concierge. The room I was shown opened out onto the pool, where some Western guests were idling. “Caucasians enjoy sunning themselves,” the marketing lady remarked with some satisfaction. Rooms have unusually large, marble-topped desks with Broadband access. Guests can order from a “pillow menu”, even before their arrival. The glass-sided coffee shop surrounded by a tropical garden with a rock waterfall is one of a kind. The Sheraton is only a brisk 15-minute walk from the Orchard Road epicentre. On sultry days take a cab. The Sheraton Towers is a sound Singapore business hotel choice.
From its position in secluded Orange Grove Road, far from city noises, the Shangri-La Hotel, Singapore is somewhere you’d need to get a taxi from. This is a big property, constructed back in 1969, and it pays for that in its façade. The Tower Wing is geared for business-orientated guests, the Garden Wing for leisure travellers, and there’s an exclusive Valley Wing with its own entrance. The good-looking Tower Wing lobby encompasses a 10m-high, 11,000sq ft space, with marble columns, chandeliers and blue-tinted glass, as well as 15 murals and paintings and six sculptures. The Garden Wing atrium is an indoor tropical jungle.
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| Shangri-La pulls out all the stops |
The guest rooms are more modest. Tower Deluxe room furniture has curved edges to create a harmonious flow. Yes, it’s feng shui. The desk is large with concealed power points and Broadband is free – a nice touch in this pay-more city. The wardrobe is a walk-in with mini dressing room, and there is a “leisure corner” spot near a window for armchair and low table. The bathroom is a big cat-swinger with double sink and a walk-in shower. The Line, the hotel’s new 24-hour contemporary-style dining room and coffee shop, is an interesting eating option with self-service international food stations, open kitchens and designer crockery. If you want to swap the city location for the seaside, there’s a sister hotel on Sentosa island, Shangri-La’s 459-room, five-star Rasa Sentosa Resort, Singapore.
The Orchard Hotel Singapore’s staff describe it as “rock and roll”. At 442 Orchard Road, this two-wing, 650-room property does have a buzz about it, particularly in the evenings when the lobby and Orchard Café are heaving, and seats at Hua Ting Restaurant are as rare as dragon’s teeth (it’s widely regarded as one of the best Chinese restaurants in town). Orchard wing superior rooms have a feng shui window in the bathroom wall so you can watch the 32-inch LCD TV while you soak. There are spot reading lights on stalks, a laptop-sized safe with charger, and some rooms include a very supportive high-backed desk-chair – best to enquire if you are planning a lengthy business trip. Bathrooms are large, a recurring feature in many Singapore hotels and a relief to larger guests. For a designer experience the hotel has four floors of opulently colourful club rooms. The most powerful design is the red-and-black with rich silks, dark rosewood, huge red drapes, framed window and black-tiled bathroom. The Executive Lounge is similarly appointed – think upmarket opium-den. Rooms in the Claymore wing have similar facilities and are fractionally larger, but the exterior looks a bit like a pharmaceutical firm and inside it’s not as much fun.
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| Stately Regent, classic/ photo: Verghese |
Staff at The Regent Singapore on Cuscaden Road are exquisitely polite, and there’s an elegant wrap-around lobby with a drive-in deli. So it’s a surprise to look up and see all the room levels set around a vast atrium (a safer choice for women travellers along with extra security if you check in solo). Up you go in the bubble lift. At 36sq m a deluxe room is classic and perfectly comfortable, but a suite is double the footprint for a few dollars extra, if you want that extra stretch space. Unfortunately, for the less agile, neither bathroom has a walk-in shower. The floor-to-ceiling windows offer either city or garden views but, given the Singapore mix, I couldn’t tell the difference. There is light and open space in most directions. WiFi is available in public areas and on club floors nine to eleven. In-room Broadband is S$24 a day. There is a safe and complimentary shoeshine. Enjoy deep, padded, clubby leather seating in the bar as a jazz trio performs, or trawl the splendid distractions of Basilico, the new signature Italian restaurant. The Regent is one of those understated Singapore business hotels where things hum along and stuff happens without your really sensing any bustle or thrum. It just ticks along like a Rolls-Royce and is, understandably, a favourite with business travellers.
Close by is the businesslike Traders Hotel, Singapore, a staple for on-the-go executive travellers, with brisk service, a central location, easy-to-catch taxis and interesting food outlets (try the jolly Ah Hoi's Kitchen poolside). Rooms have Broadband and WiFi, free only in the Club Lounge. Décor is in muted, corporate, earthy tones and features include old-style box TV, phone with dataport, safe not-quite-laptop-size, and a handy iron and ironing board combo. Traders has a well-equipped business centre, a health club and spa, and own-brand cigarettes.
Just around the corner from here, at one quiet end of Orchard Road, the gleaming St Regis Hotel, Singapore impresses with an expansive marble lobby and private art collection, including several of Fernando Botero’s voluptuous sculptures – the plump reclining nude by the front entrance has a bottom to rival J-Lo’s. The 299-room Singapore luxury hotel also features a 1,000 capacity John Jacob Ballroom with skylights, air-conditioned tennis courts and a plush Remede Spa, which elicits oohs and ahs from Singaporeans familiar with its delights – expect aquariums, ice fountains, marble beds and cedar wood. Try a warm jade stone massage, mineral wrap, ice fountain or a Vichy shower.
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| St Regis room/ photo: Verghese |
While the exterior is the sort of reflective glass façade ubiquitous in Asia these days, inside you will find luxury and technology artfully combined. The St Regis is unashamedly plush (a free-standing dive-in bathtub features in several rooms) and hi-tech – large bedside button pads control everything from “cosy” lighting to drawing the curtains. This can get fiddly. Get it figured out right away. The preset button light configurations run from cosy, and dim “movie” to “reading”, the brightest arrangement. Broadband is S$34.20 a day and WiFi is S$20++. Delicious breads abound at the good breakfast buffet, with a selection of superb jams. Treating you is what this hotel does best.
Expect a 42-inch flat-screen TV, a smaller one in the bathroom, twin vanities, massage jets in-shower, generous from-the-spa toiletries, a well thought out work desk with multi-pin sockets, Bose sound system and a 24- hour butler for all your tea and coffee needs. Butlers are handy but an in-room tea-making facility would be welcome. Rooms are spacious and movie-set spoiling. If all this is not enough, hop into a Bentley for a whisper-smooth airport transfer. The hotel offers subtle textures, muted yet rich décor, blown-glass, deep carpets, and inlaid marble floors. Finely veined marble lines the lift walls and a velvet seat is on hand for those who simply hate to stand. After hours, walk through towering silver doors into the clubby Astor Bar and unwind on a red leather chair. The St Regis is plush, without overstatement, gracious without bluster, almost Zen in its quiet detachment. Adjacent to the development are the St Regis Residences. If you're trawling for Singapore luxury hotels that offer style, service and location, this is one for your diary.
Four Seasons manages The Regent but also has an excellent hotel under its own name on Orchard Boulevard. The Four Seasons Hotel Singapore entrance is an early 19th century reception suite with Egyptian pillars, William IV armchairs, low, barrelled ceilings, shutters, black lampshades and a reception desk in twilight. It is one of those class acts where nothing totally matches but everything is in place. There’s an intimate, boutique feel to this 255-room hotel.
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| Four Seasons Premier/ photo: Verghese |
Deluxe room doors are wide, opened by a real key and even sport a doorbell. The feeling is spacious (47sq m to 51sq m) and early Victorian. Décor is light and bright in standard rooms, with WiFi and Broadband access, L’Occitane toiletry, and DVD and CD player with iPod dock. Apart from Broadband, there are lines for faxes and modems. Beds are custom-made – and for sale. Visit the gift shop. That’s right. The 134sq ft bathroom is hexagonal, with double sink, tub and walk-in shower. In a premier room on a corner position, we saw one of only two bidets we were to come across in Singapore.
Four Seasons is connected by an internal walkway to the Orchard Road Hilton Singapore, a long-time landmark and refuge on this artery of commerce and shopper abandon. The Hilton's Deluxe Rooms offer WiFi, yukata robes and a marbled bathroom while the 32sq m Executive Rooms are a tad more lavish. Rooms are modern, pastel, and offer soft lighting with blonde wood features.
The small rooftop pool offers city views and a touch of breeze. Hilton is a crisp and convenient Singapore business hotel choice. It is accessible and right in the heart of shopping mania. The lobby is far more hip than in days of yore, with a polished gleam and a succession of brand name shop windows. Checkers Brasserie offers a range of aromatic buffets for the fast pin-stripe set or those exercising their palates at a more leisurely pace.
Orchard Road’s junction with Scotts Road is where Singapore is at its most crowded and brassy. In a 30-floor pagoda above the MRT station stands the green-hat landmark Singapore Marriott Hotel, with 493 rooms directly on top of the MRT station and its foundations in at least four shopping centres. No other hotel is so melded into the town around it. Its Crossroads Cafe is a populated pavement eatery stretching back indoors seemingly the length of a football pitch.
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| Grand Hyatt Grand Room/ photo: hotel |
Deluxe rooms feature “The Table that Works”, a desk with high-speed computer connections and all the plugs, bells and whistles. Décor is quietly contemporary; there is a king-sized bed, sofa, safe, tea and coffee facilities and, like practically every other standard hotel room in town, an iron and board. There is also an executive room version. The Pool Terrace on the fifth floor has been redone. There’s an alfresco grill restaurant up there and nine cabana-style Pool Terrace Rooms leading to the pool, as well as a luxury suite with see-through bathroom wall for honeymooners.
Next door, at 10 Scotts Road, is the 663-room Grand Hyatt Singapore. Though flanked by shopping malls, all that disappears once you’re through the door. Reception is calm, with a low ceiling, black marble, slate, rocks and water. The wall of the passage connecting the Grand Wing with its street scene views and the Garden Wing with its pool view is one long waterfall. Deluxe rooms have sitting and working areas with Bang & Olufsen flat-screen TV, and retro wood panelling with “2001” spaceship seating that’s surprisingly comfy. There is a walk-in shower inside what is a huge bathroom for its class. Guests with bad backs will appreciate the eye-level mini-bar. The Grand Hyatt is one of those hotels that adapt room rates daily according to a computer programme. At the time of our visit, the best available web rate was S$350 – but it could drop to S$280 and even closer to S$200, supporting the contention of one local hotelier that it is still possible to get a five-star room in Singapore for a bit over US$100.
For slightly more, the Club Room has a 37-inch plasma TV, and a double-sided closet between bed and bathroom to help out roommates who are shy about undressing in front of one another. The 24-hour technology concierge is on hand to assist with “connectivity related challenges”. The Grand Hyatt pulls in a decent crowd to its swish mezza9 dining spread and offers the quiet Scotts lounge for a work warm-up or postprandial whispers. Later, tap your feet at swinging basement dance bar BRIX. The Grand Hyatt does well on our Singapore business hotels review with crisp service and attention to detail.
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| Meritus Mandarin: High-end |
Dead opposite the Grand Hyatt is the Royal Plaza on Scotts, a rather large, busy hotel with an über swank lobby that perhaps strains to make an impression. Entirely smoke-free, Royal Plaza offers up standard 32sq m rooms at deluxe and club levels. “Heat ultralounge” bar reflects the hotel’s modern bent, which filters through to the rooms in the form of free Broadband and WiFi. Rooms are clean but uninspiring, a decent business choice, one step down from the more luxurious hotels five-stars in this list.
The two towers of the 1,051-room Meritus Mandarin Singapore, the flagship of the Meritus group, stand halfway along Orchard Road, a business haven. Its style is opulent Oriental RED mixed with Western contemporary. Staff is courteous and quick. Rooms have a large leather office chair that seems to grow in size the higher up the room-chain you go. Expect modern décor and cream tones. The Chatterbox coffee shop is a popular hangout serving Asian titbits including hawker fare. But where Meritus really makes a huge splash is at the Marina (see Marina area hotels). The Holiday Inn Singapore Park View is a quiet, sedate, often overlooked, property that nevertheless offers a central location at 11 Cavenagh Road not far off Orchard Road, walking distance from the thrum of shops and restaurants. There are 311 smart rooms and 28 suites. Demanding executive travellers can opt for the Executive Club. For lip-smacking good Indian food there are few better spots than their curry haunt. A second Holiday Inn, Atrium Singapore, is at 317 Outram Road.
Decidedly contemporary and going for Italian designer chic is the 206-room Pan Pacific Orchard (formerly the Meritus Negara Singapore) on Claymore Road, a good mid-range business hotel option.
Singapore hotels, North Bridge Road area
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| InterContinental starched whites |
To the east of Orchard, North Bridge and Beach Roads running down to the Padang, are more traditional parts of town and some of the hotels there reflect this. At the InterContinental Singapore at Bugis Junction, you pass through an old-fashioned courtyard and enter the off-white lobby with black-and-white tile floors though French windows. The mix is classical-colonial and local. The Lounge coffee shop has pillars, an inlaid ceiling and chandeliers. A row of Chinese shophouses has been converted to “Shophouse Rooms”, with pitched ceilings and timber floors. The ethnic 1920s concept is supported by typical Straits Chinese Peranakan décor – mixed, unavoidably, with hip shopping in the street below.
Businesslike 38sq m deluxe rooms are sizeable, with pillars at the entrance and striped wallpaper. Style-wise they evoke Victorian colonial. There are comfortably big desks with Broadband and two extra phone lines, king-sized beds, and white, bright, big bathrooms with sensible walk-in shower. The InterContinental, as seems to be the growing trend with Singapore hotels, doesn’t publish rack rates. The best available rate is always accessible online.
Around the corner from the InterContinental and down Albert Street is the Albert Court Hotel, set around a courtyard, in shophouse style and with a Peranakan ambience. The rooms have all mod cons, including Broadband access, and there is a range of meeting rooms (good for small and medium-sized events) and packages on offer. The hotel is smart and the rooms simple and cosy. The convenient location and atmospheric grounds also make the hotel substantially appealing to leisure travellers.
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| Raffles heritage/ photo: Vijay Verghese |
Down the street stands Singapore’s raffish, colonial legend, Raffles Hotel Singapore. The heritage of heritage hotels, is now a posh international haunt, and listed as a “must-see” in all guidebooks. Don’t try and get in through the shopping arcade. Walk around to Beach Road, crunch over the gravel to the front door and into the front hall. A photo with the grinning turbaned doorman is pretty much obligatory. The hotel comprises the original Sarkies brothers’ block (the four Armenian Sarkie brothers were the founders of the hotel), two storeys of suites round a central court, and two later wings at each side with rooms leading onto cloisters and grass. The residents-only pool, gym and spa are on the roof.
Built in 1887 as a ten-room bungalow, the hotel was closed between 1989 and 1991 for a complete renovation. Although traditionalists complained, the original suites were in fact restored to their original 1915 proportions, meaning that false ceilings were removed and are back up to 14 feet. The Grand Hotel Suites average out at 140sq m, with master bedroom, a second bedroom, sitting room, study, pantry, 24-hour butler, big brassy light switches, service bells and a huge balcony looking onto nothing very much. They are yours for S$3,000 a night or more.
Probably more fiscally prudent are the Courtyard and Palm Court Suites to the sides. Here, you come off your verandah into the parlour and dining area, and pass through a curtained arch into a bedroom and large bathroom with old-fashioned tiles. At the very back there is a pantry. It’s a replication of a traditional colonial bungalow, kept dark for cool. The Bermuda shorts and baseball cap crowd, browsing for trinkets in the arcade, is kept at a secure distance. Seditiously scatter peanut shells at the Long Bar, sip a trademark Singapore Sling, or enjoy the curry buffet at the Tiffin Room. No, you don’t need a farthingale these days.
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| View from The Fullerton/ photo: hotel |
Fairmont Singapore (formerly Raffles The Plaza) around the corner is quite a different hotel. Joined at the hip to the Swissotel The Stamford Singapore next door, the Fairmont Singapore is a circular building with 769 rooms and a lobby of redwood fascias and quadrilateral shapes. The 70,000sq ft of meeting and conferencing space and 16 restaurants promise to keep you busy whatever the weather in Singapore. Premier deluxe rooms are 38sq m with mini-bar, safe, iron and board and coffee facilities. Plush extras are mattresses constructed from ten layers of goose feathers, a large bathtub and a wide-spray “tropical rain shower”. Just when you thought you were being treated like a prince, the extra S$29 per day for Internet access brings you back down to earth. This is a well located business hotel and the street side Prego is just place for a sunny, upbeat contract-closing chat over light pasta.
Swissôtel The Stamford Singapore lives right on top of Raffles City shopping mall and City Hall MRT station. It is a tall 60-floor cylinder and since the rooms don’t start until the seventh, everybody gets a view of some sort. Of the 1,261 rooms, 845 are Classic Rooms, 255 Classic Harbour View Rooms and 44 are Grand Rooms, all with private balconies and the usual Internet, in-room tea and coffee, hairdryer, safe and iron. While a few extra dollars get you a harbour view and the possibility of an even higher floor, ride up to Equinox Restaurant to gawk at the view. Varied cuisine and limitless views unless Indonesia has spontaneously combusted again and the haze rolls in. Both the Fairmont and Swissotel offer a spa facility.
On the other side of Raffles, across a small side street, is the 40-room boutique Naumi. Room sizes jump considerably from a 32sq m Premium to a 52sq m Deluxe Room – making it well worth the small jump in price. All rooms have a Nespresso coffee machine and either a pantry or kitchenette, iPod docking, 42-inch or 50-inch plasma TV, Kiehl’s toiletries and a tech-wise work-desk – and are smart with typically boutique splashes of this-and-that kitsch. There is also a ladies floor, accessible through a security glass door. Another imaginative extra is the “Naumi Aide” who greets you upon arrival and is available for a consult at any time, day or night. Yes, there's Wireless.
Marina area – atrium-style hotels
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| The Oriental: crisp |
Across Beach Road is the Marina Centre, on reclaimed land with several five-star hotels offering views out to sea. By Singapore’s compacted standards it’s currently a bit out of the way, with the City Hall MRT too far and walking too exposed. But this will change when the new Circle Line opens its station there, recreational development (including a casino) is completed and the marina is turned into a vast lagoon. The Oriental looks out on the ocean and lagoon-to-be. It’s dark in there, and exciting. The building is a half-dome in the style of the Mandarin Oriental logo fan and backlit. There’s dark carpet, rich colours, black marble, leather seating, a circular pavilion bar, and bubble lifts moving up and down the atrium. There is a hum. It resembles an extraterrestrial spaceship.
Eighty percent of the rooms have water views and the décor is light and bright with an “all elements of nature” theme including mother-of-pearl colouring, polished hardwood floors, Jim Thompson silk bedcovers and even gecko door handles. The hotel is completely Wireless and all rooms have surround sound that is connectable to your MP3. There’s a full technology kit available, and a range of adaptors that will find a fit even if you’re from Burkina Faso. All rooms have laptop-size safes with charging sockets. Sensors alter temperature slightly according to activity level in the room. Things getting a little hot?
Rooms (excluding the 72 suites) range from 33sq m to 49sq m. Harbour view rooms are more expensive than those overlooking the city but the floor-to-ceiling windows make them entirely worthwhile. If you can extend to a modest suite, the Ocean Suite doesn’t fuss with a dividing wall: a huge and useful desk separates bed from sofa. On the edge of the view is the expressway. Apparently businessmen like the sight of the traffic. It gives them a buzz. If you want to check your e-mails on hotel computers in the business centre or club lounge it’s around 50 cents a minute.
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| The Ritz-Carlton: blonde wood |
The Ritz-Carlton, Millenia Singapore next door, at 7 Raffles Avenue is a touch of avant-garde crossed with Star Wars. It even has its very own Star Gate, two huge circular windows, which represent dragon eyes in the feng-shui-friendly architecture. The hotel is welcoming in bright browns, fawn and gold. Look up and you are transported to the Sistine chapel in the third dimension, look down and you are back in the humming all-business real world. When comparing Singapore hotel standards, people often muse, “And then, there’s the Ritz Carlton”. It seems much of its eminence is based on the intangible “great service”.
Wooden flooring and deep, sink-in carpets fill 50sq m of standard room space, one of the largest in the city centre. The all pervading blonde wood disperses light efficiently creating a bright and airy feel. Every room has a slanting glass shade outside over the windows, which worked wonders for me. Beds face the window and baths complete the picture with ocean-views through stunning octagonal windows earning the “sexiest bathrooms” title from at least one magazine. The Ritz-Carlton lays on a butler-drawn bath and rooms stock BVLGARI toiletries. All have high-speed connection and a walk-about phone.
The hotel has a 4,000-piece contemporary art and sculpture collection, often incongruous with the plain light wood furnishings, but eye-catching nonetheless. Even if you aren’t staying, it is worth visiting for the iPod art tour. Close by the Suntec exhibition space, this is among the slicker choices among Singapore conference hotels and, even if you’re wandering about like a dork with a Widgets Anonymous name badge, you can pretend to absorb the art and impress a friend or two.
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| Pan Pacific, futuristic lifts/ photo: Verghese |
One of the original Marina atrium-style properties is the 37-floor 780-room Pan Pacific designed by John Portman & Associates that has emerged from a series of progressive renovations with a jaunty stride bordering on hallucinogenic cool. Glass bubble elevators soar up the central vertiginous atrium past a public art gallery that features local and international artists. A second rank of elevators glide up the exterior of the building presenting staggering city views en route to the exclusive Pacific Floors and the penthouse Chinese restaurant Ha Tien Lo. The bright and functional Pacific Floor rooms occupy the 33rd and 34th floors, featuring an in-room DVD-and-video player, complimentary high-speed Broadband, a smart work desk with an ergonomic chair, ironing board and iron, laptop-sized safe and generously large bottles of complimentary water.
Step in the shower and let the massage jets do their work. If all this doesn't send you to sleep, check out the extensive pillow menu and pick from organic, contour, foam or polyester. There is a useful, single, “Service One” button that you can press for any and every need, and an electronic finger-touch bedside panel for activating pretty much anything in the room that moves or can be switched on. If the bar lights fail to disappear, the secret is to open the concealed cutlery cabinet and locate the large switch next to the electric kettle. Two lounges on the Pacific Floors cater for breakfast, cocktails and a steady stream of refreshment while staff briskly attends to any request with alarming eagerness and disarming smiles.
Five other floors are set apart as Executive Business Floors and longstay guests may avail of the “Residences” scheme. Broadband is S$25++ per day and free for Executive Business floors and Pacific Club. The Indian restaurant Rang Mahal has been a “hot” favourite of those in the know for years and the mod tones, curves and privates spaces of the adjacent Global Kitchen offer an interesting counterpoint.
The undisputed Meritus jewel in the crown, The Marina Mandarin, is next to the Marina Square shopping complex. It’s one of those bustling, come-and-go five-stars with popular outlets, including Singapore’s first, and still premier, Italian restaurant. As with the Ritz-Carlton, the rooms start higher up to give everyone a view, so baggage is handled on the ground floor but reception begins on the fourth.
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| Marina Mandarin Deluxe: Reborn |
Off the 21-level atrium are Deluxe, Premier and Meritus Club rooms (linked to the executive lounge), all with Broadband and WiFi. I thought the rooms had an interesting Japanese touch to them (but was told the Japanese designer might hotly deny this!), and theme furniture. The deluxe room is simple but stylishly appointed, with a big work-desk, a TV in an armoire and a large bathroom with twin vanities. The premier room is a bit more Zen with a flat screen TV and a laptop-friendly safe. Club rooms have huge flat screens and exotic complimentary fruits, chocolates and even cake, all of which can account for a lost hour or two. Showers feature “water massage” power jets. The Meritus Club has a well-designed flow, privacy around the computer terminals and a splendid buffet breakfast. A man is contracted to bring his birds in their cages to the hotel every morning, hanging them on a lower floor walkway from where they sing up through the hotel all day.
The Conrad Centennial Singapore at Temasek Boulevard has rather less of a marine view but a direct line on the Fountain of Wealth connected to the Suntec complex (the story goes that you should wet your hands in it, return to Singapore, and get instant wealth). This is a crisp choice among Singapore business hotels, in a prime office area. The lobby is black, gold and silver with the compulsory tsar and tsarina descending staircase, but the guest rooms conjure up fruit juice: the colour scheme is a light mango, all over. Rooms are a decent 43sq m to 63sq m, all with a generous 46″ LCD TV and Broadband is a little over S$29 per day (Wireless is free in public spaces), two direct phone lines, a big desk, in-room tea and coffee, safe and ironing board, as well as a gratifyingly big walk-in shower. As at all Conrads business travellers will find, perhaps for late evening company, a rubber duck and a teddy bear that I never quite know what to do with. The hotel has an extensive Asian art collection and supports the Singapore Symphony Orchestra.
Central Business District, Chinatown, Clark Quay hotels
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| Fullerton elegance/ photo: Verghese |
At the other end of the Padang, an icon heading up the business district, is one of the most novel hotel developments of recent years, The Fullerton Hotel. The building was completed in 1928, a classical granite monolith with Doric columns exuding confidence and authority at the mouth of the river. Initially used as government offices and General Post Office, it was turned into a hotel in 1999, in a definite case of thinking outside the (post) box. The triangular-shaped building has been crafted into 400 rooms and suites, conference facilities, four restaurants and a bar. Savour exquisite wasabi prawn at the Chinese retreat Jade, gaze out at the river from The Courtyard, or pop up to the reincarnated Lighthouse.
No two rooms have exactly the same shape. The former Singapore Club’s poolroom has been kept intact and the cavernous inner courtyard, the former posting hall, is so large that some rooms look out into it. The better views, of course, are outward facing, looking across the river towards Boat Quay and the durian of the Esplanade. Quay Rooms are tall, bright and imperial. The real delight is the 26sq m bathroom, which is as big as the room itself, with Molton Brown toiletries in Club rooms and BVLGARI in Suites. A shoeshine niche adds to the eclectic mix and colonial throwback vibe. Behind the Doric columns and impossibly high windows, some spaces have been split into Loft Suite duplexes with spiral staircases. The double sets of curtains are fun to play with – all room curtains are motor-controlled. (One-bedroom Palladian suites with water views go for S$900.)
The hotel is unstuffy and keen to be a popular gathering point. Generations of ordinary Singaporeans have worked their way through the building as civil servants and it is not unusual for individuals (including government ministers) to pop in and ask what their old offices look like now. The management says it always tries to oblige. Already widely regarded as one of the best Singapore business hotels, The Fullerton has additional acts up its elegant sleeve. Watch for the exclusive boutique 100-room sister-property that will come on line later at Clifford Pier. (The Fullerton Hotel Singapore features in our exclusive Top Asian Hotels Collection, featuring the best Asian hotels, resorts and spas in a printable A4 page with stunning visuals.)
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| Ascott Studio, art deco retreat |
A short stroll from here is the head-turning art deco Ascott Raffles Place, once the tallest building in Asia, now an elegant longstay residential option in the Lion City. While catering, with considerable class, for high-end travellers in need of a long-stay hotel in Singapore, the place has oomph as a business hotel too. In-room fittings are smart and modern with a lot of generous touches. Expect Gaggenau kitchen systems, fridge, dishwasher, washing machine, enough cutlery to invite the queen, parquet wood flooring and windows welcoming of light with long slat blinds. Colours are corporate and toned down with dominant greys and muted tones with splashes of bright carpet providing subtle counterpoint. Split-level studios might be just the ticket for pin-stripers with attitude. The leather-top work desk is another example of the clean and thoughtful finish. Guests will find three multi-pin electric sockets, cables, multi-media sockets, high speed Broadband, and a large laptop-size safe complete with charger. Keep safe and powered up. Hirsch Bedner, who did the interiors, have left untouched the original brass mail chute. Studio Premiers start at 50sq m with one-bedroom units at 75-108sq m.
The distinctive red-tiled roof topped by three spires marks Park Hotel Clarke Quay’s arrival on Singapore’s skyline. Earthy tones run throughout the 336 rooms and suites, which are modern with a few Asian flourishes like silk drapes. Standard amenities include WiFi, 32-inch LCD TV, data port, IDD telephone, safe, minibar and rainshower in the marble bathroom. Views are of the city or Singapore River.
Chinatown proper is a district of preserved and developed shophouses and it is here where some Singapore boutique hotels thrive. Among the pioneers were the Berjaya Singapore Hotel (formerly The Duxton) and Hotel 1929. The 48-room Berjaya Hotel on Duxton Road has a shophouse exterior and colonial-style interior. Endearingly, no two rooms are the same although all sport dark woods against pastel walls. The place is small, welcoming and cosy. At the other end of the scale, Hotel 1929 has a great sense of the unconventional in a very straight city. If you have a sense of humour about skylights, a distinct lack of wardrobes and a shower over the toilet, the oddly shaped rooms and great location will suit you – particularly if you are travelling light and staying only a night or two. Its pint-sized Casa Mediterranea had a great reputation in its former incarnation as Ember, at the Duxton. The restaurant serves Italian and Mediterranean fare.
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| The Scarlet: Baroque touches |
But boutiques are all about trends and two others are on everyone’s lips these days. The Scarlet on Erskine Road is probably the most delightfully camp and lush. Somehow, 85 rooms and suites, two restaurants and a moody lift have been fitted in. Edwardian houses of boudoir pleasure never came more rouged, velvety and brocaded than this, but you can still take the kids – just about. Standard rooms are themed, with dark woods and wrought iron, but they are on the small side. A few only have skylights. Executive and premium rooms are more elaborate and fully wired. Opulent, Lavish and Passion rooms are riotous, with combinations like “purple, aubergine and mauve”, “emerald green, gold and rust with gold sunburst bed-set” and “jet black, matt gold and cardinal red”. Food at the Scarlet is really rather fine and a lot of fun if you like sex with your sauces. In the Desire restaurant they have a dessert called “the G-String”. Did I say something about the kids? The place aims to be top dog in the Singapore boutique hotels sweepstakes.
The New Majestic on Bukit Pasah Road, is another Singapore boutique hotel every hip dude is talking about. It was once a neighbourhood cinema, which is why the open white lobby is big enough for the owner’s collection of designer chairs. When I arrived, a bronze male nude was getting a leg polish from a cleaning lady. There are just 30 rooms and the property has the only shophouse swimming pool in town. There are four basic room types, where design concepts are let rip: “Mirror” (watch and be watched is the catchphrase), “Hanging Bed” (the fourposter is actually suspended over the floor), “Loft” (where the sleeping chamber is elevated above the living space) and the controversial “Aquarium” (where the centre-piece is the bath). Five of the rooms were given to local designers to have a go. Themes range from “Fluid” and “Work” to the rather naughty “The Pussy Parlour”, with French chandelier, neon lights and mirrors.
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| New Majestic: Capricious |
Premier Garden Rooms, with baths outside in little gardens with interconnecting doors, cater to parties where the baths are used for stashing the booze on ice. All rooms have WiFi, plasma TVs and CD/Radio Bose stereos. It is a relaxed and bright property. The restaurant downstairs serves “modern Cantonese cuisine”. The food is good.
Novotel Clarke Quay offers easy access to Orchard Road, Raffles Place and, of course, Clark Quay. This four-star choice has 401 rooms including 18 suites, a 25-metre outdoor pool, and a full-service business centre and meeting facilities. There are three restaurants (Indian, Cantonese and International) and complimentary shuttle service to Raffles Place and City Hall.
Havelock Road area hotels
A kilometre away, off Havelock Road on a stretch of the Singapore river yet to be claimed by groovy wining and dining, are half a dozen four to five-star hotels, including the River View, the Novotel Apollo, The Mirimar, the Concorde and two Copthorne hotels. It is described as an up-and-coming precinct and is well placed for the business district and industrial places to the east and south. The hardy walk up to Orchard Road. Prominent on the junction with Kim Seng Road and with a terraced coffee shop right on the river is the 538-room Grand Copthorne Waterfront Hotel Singapore.
The hotel is of the grand-lobby-and-forecourt-fountain school. With large conference facilities, it is very much tuned to business and the meetings business as well as leisure travellers, in crisp and courteous style. The superior room is perfectly adequate but for a few dollars extra the deluxe provides more space and double windows. There’s a shuttle service to all major town centres and you can always take a “bum boat” ride down the river.
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| Capella Singapore/ photo: Vijay Verghese |
The Millennium & Copthorne Company owns a small empire of hotels in Singapore, including the M Hotel. This property at 81 Anson Road, at the south end of the business district, was the regional leader in creating a sort of wrap-around business hotel. “We don’t have a business centre. We are one”, was the catch phrase. It opened with all cyber bells and whistles in the rooms, Bose sound flat screen TVs, ergonomic design, retro furniture, and public area Wireless access when these features were mere twinkles in the eyes of others. Gimmicks included a mirror wall between bedroom and bathroom that turned opaque at a button push. All right, that’s been copied since, too.
The Holiday Inn Atrium Singapore is a well-known property housed in a grey reflective-glass 27-storey tower with an atrium-style set-up inside. The Holiday Inn Atrium is at 317 Outram Road at the junction with Havelock Road. Expect high-speed Internet and enjoy an outdoor pool.
Sentosa Island resorts, Singapore casino hotels
If you want to turn your back on the city, cross over the Causeway Bridge, pay S$2 a head (if staying in a Sentosa hotel the fee is waived) and enter Sentosa Island, minding the crossing monkeys as the signs bid you.
Marking Singapore’s Great Leap Forward into megaresorts and set in 30 verdant acres of Sentosa Island, Capella Singapore is a world away from the bustling city. This heritage property was previously used by the occupying military for gala events. It remains suitably aloof in style and substance. A colonial white façade and low red roof is surrounded by manicured gardens. Staff is attentive but not invasive – there is plenty of space for privacy here. From the white marble and dark wood of the main building, rooms extend outwards in two sweeping curves of modern yet complimentary wings.
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| Hotel Michael lobby/ photo: Verghese |
Both “arms” remain at the original building’s height and remain hidden from the front. Rooms are large, starting at 77sq m, with high ceilings and a neat side balcony. Arranged in resort style, twin vanities and a “walk-through” wardrobe sit behind the bed, which faces floor-to-ceiling windows and views over the ocean. Décor is modern with any awkward necessities hidden by smooth curves of dark furniture. Expect touchpad lighting (with regular everyday switches for the uninitiated), swivel LCD television, iPod docking station, free WiFi, and complimentary daily-replenished soft drink minibar.
Capella’s signature Auriga Spa has carved out a niche for itself, offering an organic pharmacy and lunar cycle therapies. Capella’s grounds include 53 pools, three of which are cascading, with a shallow pool for youngsters. Large sun loungers are a tempting offer in or out of the steamy Singapore sun. Sentosa Island features two championship golf courses and now a Universal Studios theme park. Tour all this and more in the comfort of Capella’s Mercedes fleet or one of its Rolls Royce Phantoms.
The latest shake-em-up arrival to this formerly sleepy island in January 2010, is Resorts World, which hosts five hotels and a Spa Villa (opening later). The by-invitation-only Crockfords Tower is an all-suite hotel with suites, mansions and villa accommodation. Hotel Michael, positioned as a Singapore boutique hotel, though it is larger than that cachet would suggest, is aimed at art lovers with trendy decor. Expect lost of blonde wood, bright colours and concealed lighting. Hard Rock Hotel Singapore provides its signature blend of music and mod managing to appear the most cheerful and friendly of the lot, set in a horseshoe shape ringing an imitation-beach sanded pool area and a "coliseum". Hard Rock is clearly aiming to set the benchmark when it comes to Singapore family-friendly hotels. The Festive Hotel is again a more relaxed holiday escape for the whole family. This is a child-friendly hotel with novelty packs for kids and tailored bathrobes. Last but not least, and opening later again, is Equarius Hotel, aimed at families and nature boffins.
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| Hard Rock Sentosa/ photo: Vijay Verghese |
As Singapore correspondent Lydia Soh says, "I was strangely underwhelmed but besides predicting that the Hard Rock bar oozes potential to be the next chic hangout (think white uncluttered space strewn with minimalistic designer furniture), two things made an impression. These being the Victoria's Secret boutique at Festival Hotel that will surely bring on stampedes of eager lovelies, and the smiley mandarin-collared bouncer at the entrance to Crockfords, the priciest establishment on the block. Entry was by invitation only, he informed us. He was faultlessly polite and so genuinely apologetic that I left more amused than offended."
Look forward to casinos and gaming galore at Resorts World Casino, a music and dance circus spectacular, Voyage de la Vie, a Marine Life Park, Festive Walk for dining and shopping, a Kids Club, wellness treatments by ESPA, and the much-touted Universal Studios Singapore. While this all sounds grand, the hotel complex may be a tad too compact and cheek-by-jowl for some and lacking in differentiation. The resorts are along one circular road around Universal on a less-than-perfect stretch of Sentosa. No beach to speak of in this particular patch and not the best views. Rooms will look out at the causeway linking the island to Singapore, and other hotels, albeit low-rise. For beach and ocean views you'll need to hunt elsewhere on Sentosa, perhaps at Capella or Beaufort. But for a wild time and maybe even a duffel bag stacked with winnings, this could be the ticket as Singapore casinos finally take off.
Run by Beaufort Hotels, The Sentosa Singapore has 214 rooms, suites and garden villas, two restaurants, a pool and conference facilities for up to 400. The Terrace Bar is lovely enough to stay until you fall off your stool. Deluxe rooms have substantial steady furniture, are quiet and on the dark side and blessed with good-sized bathrooms. A lobby entrance divides suite bedroom and sitting areas, which is splendid if you have a noisome family gathering you want to escape from.
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| Sentosa Singapore/ photo: Verghese |
In fact, for family-friendly Singapore resorts, Sentosa is a good hunting ground – you could easily be in a chalet up the Malay coast. Shuttles to and from the city centre run regularly. Food is excellent – try The Cliff – there’s a nice spa, and conference facilities galore.
Looking for Singapore conference hotels for a corporate meeting or a place with a difference for a family getaway? The Sentosa Resort & Spa (as it is also known) is for you.
Nearby is the 459-room Shangri-La’s Rasa Sentosa Resort, set on Siloso Beach, a very relaxed family choice with a fun ambience and a Rasa Spa. Splash into the large freeform pool or part the bubbles at two outdoor Jacuzzis.
Mothers listen up. This is a very child friendly Singapore hotel with its very own Toots Club for tiny tykes. Rooms are unfussy with warm tones and feature individual balconies to catch the sea breeze.
Singapore Airport hotels
If you’re in transit in Singapore and need to be close to the airport for an early morning red-eye, like watching aeroplanes, or simply enjoy the novelty of living in a place that resembles a half-unwrapped chocolate box, Crowne Plaza Changi Airport is an option. It is adjacent to the airport and linked to Terminal 3 by SkyTrain. The playfully modern exterior is hard to miss, a construct meant to resemble confetti, with a bit torn off across the middle. It’s eye-catching, avant-garde, and odd. The 320 rooms feature satellite TVs, Broadband access (S$33 per day), two-line phones, work desks, coffee and tea-making facilities, and mini-bar. There are separate showers and tubs in bathrooms.
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| Capella resort pool/ photo: Vijay Verghese |
Families are well looked after with cribs and cots available on request (for S$60). The hotel has a strong business suite with work facilities including 10 meeting rooms with the latest AV equipment and a ballroom for larger events or conferences. Guests in the Executive Club rooms get access to the Club Lounge, overlooking the pool. The lounge offers complimentary Internet access, breakfast, evening cocktails, business services, and personalised check-in. To wine and dine, try one of the four restaurants or two bars – the 30-metre swimming pool and 24-hour fitness centre might just help to burn off dessert.
So there you have it, our A-Z of Singapore business hotels, a few boutique servings and some child-friendly resorts. Take your pick and don’t forget to drive a hard bargain. There's a hotle for everyone.
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