The Peninsula Hong Kong

A Grande Dame on Salisbury Road, Since 1928

The Peninsula opened on 11 December 1928 at the junction of Nathan Road and Salisbury Road, planned from the outset as the finest hotel east of Suez, and it has spent nearly a century building the kind of reputation that cannot be bought with a renovation budget. A 1994 tower expansion added rooms while leaving the original facade, forecourt and lobby untouched, and a later refurbishment of the guest floors left the ground-floor public rooms deliberately unchanged. It remains the flagship of the Peninsula Hotels group, and still looks the part of the colonial-era icon it was built to be.

Why It Works

Few hotels anywhere operate a signature fleet, but the Peninsula runs fourteen long-wheelbase Rolls-Royce Phantoms painted in its own shade of green, the largest single order Rolls-Royce has ever taken from one customer. A rooftop helipad lands VIP guests roughly seven minutes from Hong Kong International Airport, skipping the road entirely. The lobby's English-style afternoon tea, served under its coffered ceiling, has become a Hong Kong institution independent of the hotel itself, drawing guests and locals who have never booked a room. It is a rare case of a hotel's smallest daily ritual becoming as famous as the building around it.

Why This Location

Salisbury Road sits across from the old ocean liner quays and close to the Star Ferry pier, putting the hotel at the historic gateway to Kowloon before the harbour tunnel and MTR made the crossing to Hong Kong Island instant. Nathan Road's shopping stretches north from the doorstep, and the Tsim Sha Tsui waterfront promenade runs along the harbour a short walk away. For travellers who want the Kowloon side of the city, with its own skyline views back toward Central, the address has anchored the neighbourhood for close to a century.

Fast Facts

• Prix : €€€€

• Vibe : colonial grande dame, ceremonial, deeply traditional

• Chambres : rooms and suites across the original building and the later tower

• Best For : heritage-minded travellers, afternoon tea rituals, classic Kowloon stays

• Our Favorite Thing About the Hotel : the fleet of fourteen green Rolls-Royce Phantoms waiting at the forecourt

• Dining : Gaddi's (French, chef's table), Felix (Philippe Starck design), Spring Moon (Cantonese), Imasa (Japanese), Chesa (Swiss)

• Amenities : rooftop helipad, English-style afternoon tea in the lobby, fashion arcade, spa and fitness facilities

• Attractions : Star Ferry pier (short walk), Tsim Sha Tsui waterfront promenade (nearby), Nathan Road shopping (adjacent)

Fourteen Green Rolls-Royces and a Rooftop Helipad

The Rolls-Royce fleet is not a marketing flourish; it is a genuine operating fleet, repainted and maintained in the hotel's own green rather than any factory standard colour, and it replaced an earlier generation of Silver Spur cars when the order was placed. Guests arriving or departing by helicopter skip the road network between the airport and Kowloon entirely, landing directly on the Peninsula Tower's rooftop pad. Between the cars and the helicopter, the hotel offers one of the only genuinely seamless airport-to-room experiences in the city, built for guests who measure a stay by the friction it removes as much as by the room itself.

Eight Restaurants, One of Hong Kong's Original Chef's Tables

The hotel runs eight restaurants under one roof, a scale that lets guests change registers entirely between meals: Gaddi's for gourmet French cuisine, with one of the city's first chef's tables set inside the kitchen itself; Felix, designed by Philippe Starck, for a different kind of drama entirely; Spring Moon for Cantonese cooking sometimes credited with inventing XO sauce; Imasa for Japanese; and Chesa for Swiss comfort food, an unusual inclusion that has quietly outlasted most food trends around it. It is a dining programme built for a long stay rather than a single memorable dinner.