The Ritz-Carlton Hong Kong
Local Transportation
MTR Kowloon Station
Exit D2 – Walk🚶🏻 5 mins
Stayed: July-September 2020 (4 stays)
Updated: September 2020
Our Rating
One good thing about Marriott Bonvoy program is that we now got a lot more hotels to choose from. And for a luxury hotel in Hong Kong, it would either be the St. Regis or the Ritz-Carlton. We liked the St. Regis but we also wanted to try the Ritz-Carlton in Hong Kong. The Ritz-Carlton Hong Kong claims to be the highest hotel in the world; occupying Level 102 through Level 118 of the International Commerce Centre in Kowloon. It’s really high up in the clouds with a panoramic view of the city as well as the Victoria Harbour.
However, a big drawback of the Ritz-Carlton for us is that they don’t offer club lounge access to elite members and the club lounge access itself would cost us almost an additional 50% over the basic room rate. The club lounge, though, provides five food and beverage servings (including champagne and alcoholic drinks) throughout the day plus a mid-night snack and unlimited tea and coffee to the room. So, it is not a bad deal after all if we could at least enjoy the afternoon tea as well as all-you-can-drink champagne. And that’s probably what we want to do during a staycation.
Also, Ritz-Carlton only offers suite upgrade for Titanium or Ambassador members and the Ritz-Carlton in Hong Kong would only upgrade to a Deluxe Suite (without club lounge benefit) and does not include special suite like the Premier Executive Suite, Carlton Suite, and of course, the Ritz-Carlton Suite. We did try to book a standard room and see if the hotel honours the suite upgrade benefit – which they did and upgraded our booking to a deluxe suite a day before check-in.
But then, interestingly, we found that the packaged rates of a suite was just a couple hundred Hong Kong dollars more than a standard room with club access. At the end, we booked the suite (which includes club access) and requested an upgrade to a special suite, if available, at the hotel’s discretion.
All in all, we had four wonderful stays at the Ritz-Carlton Hong Kong over the summer as we like it so much and had stayed in three different suites including the Premier Executive Suite and the Carlton Suite. The excellent service at the club lounge and that amazing panoramic view of the harbour had us keep going back for another staycation.
Victoria Harbour Suite
At our first stay in July, we got upgraded to the Executive Suite upon check-in at the lounge but it was not ready until 5PM. It was no big deal as we were planning to have afternoon tea at the lounge anyway. The staff was very helpful and let us stayed at the suite that we booked while we waited for the Executive Suite. The Victoria Harbour Suite was nice but more like a junior suite in some other hotel chain. The view, though, was spectacular.
Premier Executive Suite
The Executive Suite was ready for us right after we finished our afternoon tea. It’s almost 50% bigger than the Victoria Harbour Suite. It’s very spacious with a separate living room and a work desk. It also has a lovely marble bathroom with a big window. The panoramic view of the Victoria Harbour and skyline of Hong Kong Island was truly spectacular. YY particularly liked the lounger in the bedroom and he could just sit there and dream away the day. The suite was almost perfect except that it doesn’t have a dining table.
A Symphony of Lights
A Symphony of Lights is a light and sound show displayed every night with good weather at 8PM since 2004. It is the world’s largest permanent light and sound show according to Guinness World Records. The best vantage points “normally” would be the “Avenue of Stars” on the Tsim Sha Tsui waterfront and on the waterfront promenade outside the Golden Bauhinia Square in Wan Chai. But nowhere can compare to the panoramic view from the Ritz-Carlton Hong Kong; especially in our own suite.
Club Lounge
The club lounge, located on Level 116, is indeed quite secluded from the rest of the hotel and offers a very tranquil environment for guest to leisurely spend time there with complimentary food and drinks. The lounge also has a small library/reading room, meeting room, and computers with printers.
The food provided at the lounge were quite good – those you would typically find at a higher standard airport/hotel lounge. The complimentary afternoon tea set was nice and comparable to those one would normally find at a tea salon or hotel lobby lounge.
We liked the club lounge and found the staff all very nice, helpful and courteous. It’s definitely worth the money if you appreciate personalized service and/or enjoy a nice afternoon tea with a view up in the clouds. And, of course, it’s a steal if you have an insatiable appetite for champagne!
Sunset from the Club Lounge
Since our suite was facing the Victoria Harbour, we were unable to see the sunset in our room. We heard that the swimming pool was a good spot to see the sunset and the pool surely was very beautiful at sunset. However, we found that the library/reading room at the club lounge an even better spot.
Swimming Pool and Gym
The indoor infinity pool on Level 118 was really impressive. The pool looked amazing with the mirrored ceiling and the LED wall display made the whole area vibrant and full of energy. Baby Lopei and Baby Corn particularly liked the LED wall so much that they thought they were in an aquarium swimming with different sea animals!
After spending the morning at the pool, we had lunch at the Italian restaurant, Tosca di Angelo. The lunch was lovely and we liked it very much (will do a separate post on this). The lunch took us around two and half hours and we finally checked-out around 5PM.
This sums up our first stay at the Ritz-Carlton Hong Kong in July. Everything was perfect – upgraded to the executive suite, excellent service at the club lounge, delicious afternoon tea, great fun at the pool and a superb lunch at Tosca di Angelo. This stay was so impressive that it made us go again in early August.