The Upper House

The Upper House rewrote Hong Kong's luxury playbook when it opened above Pacific Place in Admiralty. Architect André Fu, then early in his rise, stripped away the grand-hotel apparatus—no ballroom, no chandeliers, barely a lobby—and composed instead an ascending sequence of calm: a bamboo-lined 'upward journey' of escalators and sculpted corridors that delivers guests to rooms beginning on the 38th floor.

Those rooms remain among the most intelligently designed in Asia. Even entry-level categories are generous by Hong Kong standards, wrapped in limestone, pale oak and paper-screen light, with 'wet areas' whose deep tubs face the harbour or Victoria Peak through floor-to-ceiling glass. The apartment-like ease is deliberate; the house style is residential, youthful and unstuffy, with iPads long standing in for reception desks.

Salisterra, the restaurant on the 49th floor, serves Mediterranean-leaning cooking against sweeping harbour views, and the adjacent Sky Lounge pours one of the city's best-situated afternoon teas. There is no pool or spa—in-room wellness and the adjacent mall's facilities partially compensate—yet loyalty to this address runs deep. For design-minded travellers, it is still the Hong Kong hotel that feels most like the future, sixteen years on.