Island Shangri-La, Hong Kong

A Silk Painting Sixteen Storeys Tall, Seen Only by Guests

Island Shangri-La occupies the upper floors of Two Pacific Place in Admiralty, a tower that rises more than 200 metres above Queensway, and its best-known feature is invisible from the street. The Great Motherland of China, a silk painting made of 250 panels, climbs an internal wall across sixteen storeys of the hotel's inner atrium, a space reserved for guests alone. A team of forty artists from Beijing spent six months completing it, and the hotel has built an art collection of several hundred further pieces around it, including 771 Viennese chandeliers through its public spaces. It is a scale of commitment to art rarely matched by a hotel this size.

Why It Works

Two Michelin-starred restaurants operate at opposite ends of the building, literally: Summer Palace serves Cantonese cuisine on the fifth floor, while Restaurant Petrus occupies the 56th, its French menu paired with some of the highest harbour views available from any dining room on the island. Both were recognised in the Michelin Guide's first Hong Kong and Macau edition and have kept their stars since. Few hotels can offer two kitchens of this calibre under one roof, fewer still can offer them fifty floors apart with a view attached to each.

Why This Location

The hotel connects directly to Admiralty MTR station, putting Central, Wan Chai and Kowloon within a few stops without ever stepping onto a street corner to find a taxi. Hong Kong Park, with its wide lawns, aviary and tai chi gardens, sits immediately next door, a rare stretch of green so close to a five-star tower. For travellers who want an easy loop between business meetings, shopping at Pacific Place and a quiet morning walk, the position removes most of the friction a visit to central Hong Kong usually involves.

Fast Facts

• Prix : €€€€

• Vibe : grand, art-filled, classic five-star scale

• Chambres : rooms and suites, harbour or Victoria Peak views, 34 suites

• Best For : fine-dining travellers, art lovers, business stays in Admiralty

• Our Favorite Thing About the Hotel : the 250-panel silk painting climbing sixteen storeys through the guest-only atrium

• Dining : Summer Palace (Cantonese, Michelin-starred), Restaurant Petrus (French, Michelin-starred, 56th floor), Café TOO (buffet)

• Amenities : Health Club with caviar-crystal treatment, 39th-floor library, Horizon Club Lounge, 24-hour fitness facilities

• Attractions : Admiralty MTR station (connected), Hong Kong Park (adjacent), Pacific Place shopping (connected)

Two Michelin Tables, Fifty Floors Apart

The distance between Summer Palace and Restaurant Petrus is not just a matter of floors: one serves refined Cantonese cooking rooted in Chinese banquet tradition, the other plates French cuisine from a dining room with some of the best harbour views in the city. Both earned recognition in Michelin's debut Hong Kong and Macau guide and have held their stars in the editions since, a consistency that matters more than a single good year. Guests who book dinner at both across a stay get two distinct registers of fine dining without leaving the building, a rare proposition even among the city's grand hotels.

An Art Collection Beyond the Atrium

The silk painting draws the attention, but it is only the centrepiece of a wider collection running to several hundred works across the hotel's public spaces, supplemented by regular art fairs and auctions held in its ballroom. The 771 Viennese chandeliers add their own layer of craft to the interiors, a detail easy to miss on a first pass through the lobby but hard to miss once pointed out. For travellers who treat a hotel stay as part of a cultural itinerary rather than a backdrop to it, the property rewards slowing down rather than rushing to the room.