Mandarin Oriental Munich

Hotel description

Despite its distinctly old-fashioned appearance, this is, perhaps, Munich's most sophisticated hotel. Small and discreet, the Mandarin Oriental is still widely referred to by its old name, the Rafael, though this 19th century building was only converted to a hotel in 1990.

This is probably due to the fact that many of the guests have been devotees since the hotel since it first opened, and often come several times a year (Zubin Mehta stays here every time he conducts the Opera series). Evidently, they all like the fruit on check-in, the newspaper in the morning, and the extremely familiar, extremely friendly faces of the concierge and the barman. An added bonus - everything in the mini bar is on the house. And the food, by the way, is absolutely sensational. Should you find yourself burnt out - as many visitors to Germany do - on bratwurst and strudel escape downstairs to one of the city's best centers of modern cuisine, the Mark restaurant.

Your physical surroundings aren't so shabby either. The air is redolent with the many flowers strewn throughout. The Mandarin Oriental prides itself on its collection of prints and etchings, which includes several from its former namesake, the Italian painter Raphael himself. Real antiques decorate rooms that are architecturally quirky in a way unique to buildings over a century old. Like Prince Charles, you might want to sleep in room 608, which features a sitting room in a turret, and will make you feel like Rapunzel. Opinion is divided on the best aspect about the hotel, though. Some say it's the location - walking distance from anything you would possibly want to see in Munich, the Opera, the Marienplatz, shopping, and the Maximilianstrasse. Some say it's the nice pianist at the piano bar. But others say, hands down, that it's the terrace on the roof with its garden and heated pool from which you can see the Alps.