The Reverie Saigon

Reverie Saigon – Hồ Chí Minh‎

Where: The Reverie Saigon, in the heart of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.

It is in a great location, close to Notre Dame Cathedral, the People’s Committee Building, the Reunification Palace and the Central Post Office.

The Back Story: The hotel that opened in September 2015 is big, bold and beautiful.

There is plenty of Italian-styled bling showing great workmanship.

Each room, along with a majority of the hotel’s interiors, have been designed by the Italian interior designers including Colombostile, Giorgetti, Provasi and Visonaire.

Yes, it certainly has that “wow” factor and is a fun place to stay.

The hotel and residences are located on the 27^th to 39^th floors of the 164m tall Times Square building with eight storeys of offices and showrooms including some of the high-end Italian furniture brands featured throughout the hotel.

Feng Shui

A feng shui master was brought in to consult on the building’s layout. An L-shape style was chosen to maximise exposure to the southern sun and rounded corners purposely built to offer the best, most uninterrupted views.

The entrances on Dong Khoi Street, Nguyen Hue Boulevard and the ground floor entrance lobby between the two storied streets were positioned to bring positive energy – chi into the building and keep it there.

Hotel: It’s not your conventional everyday hotel –it is overstated rather than understated and proud of it.

There are 12 styles of accommodation with 286 rooms and suites alongside 89 fully furnished serviced apartments that are among the largest in the city with stunning views of the winding Saigon River and the city skyline.

Rooms and Interiors:

Italian design and meticulous workmanship shines here.

Our spacious suite featured sumptuous silk decor and intricate tiling with fabulous river views.

It was a haven from the busy streets below and at times you just feel like staying put and enjoying all the facilities. It featured television in the bathroom, Nespresso machine, walk in wardrobe and media hub.

The most talked about rooms include the designer suite by Giorgetti with an elegant canopy bed with a base made from fiddleback sycamore and a handcrafted armchair from the brand’s iconic Progetti line made of leather and Brazilian pau ferro wood.

In the Saigon Suite, an Allen dining table and Barrel chairs originally designed by Frank Lloyd Wright were exclusively reproduced by Cassina, and a copy of a Veliero bookcase, an engineering marvel originally designed by Franco Albini in 1940 and comprising of 1800 individual pieces.

Renowned Italian brands furnish the rooms and suites with large bathrooms showcasing intricate tiling in soft colours.

No expense has been spared with 12,000 metres of exquisite fabrics and wall coverings by Rubelli, the same 126-year-old Venetian fabric manufacturer which outfitted the private boxes of the famed Teatro alla Scala in Milan and created the handwoven stage curtains for Moscow’s Bolshoi Theatre.

Vibrant mosaics by Sicis of Italy, reminiscent of those found in grand Venetian palazzos, can also be found throughout the hotel from the towering walls of flowers adorning the seventh floor lobby to the white and gold mosaics that line the winding staircase of The Spa.

Dining

There is plenty of choice here.

The Royal Pavilion serves delicious authentic Cantonese cuisine and has a great following –the Peking Duck is fabulous.

The restaurant that has nine private rooms as well as a spacious main dining room is decorated in jade, vermilion and gold shades with chairs by Provasi, reflecting an Asian-inspired palette of regal red and gold and fine Italian craftsmanship.

Delicacies such as abalone, sea cucumber, bird’s nest, suckling pig, dim sum and honey-glazed barbeque pork are popular.

For seafood lovers there is lots of selections including king prawns barbequed Vietnamese-style and Hong Kong-style garoupa.

Vegetarians are well catered for too, with the popular braised ‘8 Treasure’ vegetables and signature steamed whole tomato stuffed with assort fungi.

Enjoy good Italian cuisine? Then head R and J Italian for a great pizza or pasta while the elegant Cafe Cardinal has a French influenced menu.

Serving breakfast and lunch its marble counters are laden with first-course and dessert selections too good to refuse.

The all-day dining menu has a dozen main courses on offer and made-to-order, from steak and eggs to seafood fried rice, from black cod with chorizo to wok-fried lobster with black peppercorn.

At dinner, the a la carte menu is a tribute to classical French cuisine and for dessert, classical French desserts including mille feuille and baba au rhum star.

Afternoon tea features many European selections including Austrian linzer torte, French eclairs and English scones and has a great following with guests and the public.

The Deli is perfect for tasty sandwiches and snacks and the trendy The Long @Times Square is definitely the longest bar in the city. Itstretches between the fashionable street, Dong Khoi, and its most monumental boulevard, Nguyen Hue.

The long bar and café features an arched skylight that runs its length with marble-topped counter in six individual segments, stretching 48 metres across.

It serves great pizza with an Italian chef from Napoli who draws on recipes that go back three generations. Asian and Western food is also served and you can’t go past the green papaya salad and tiger prawns with Vietnamese herbs, barbeque pork ribs and a glitzy gold leafbeef burger.

The gelato bar has 32 homemade flavours, including Asian favourites such as soursop, purple sticky rice and salted caramel cashew.

Features

The Spa is impressive and you feel like you are climbing the stairway to heaven as you ascend for your treatment.

There are six individual treatment rooms, four couple’s treatment room, and seven hair and nail rooms.

Massage, facial, body and beauty treatments are offered to nourish the body and mind.

If you are after a treat, the two hour Reverie Harmony includes a massage performed by two therapists in unison in a remarkable ritual that inspires a harmony of the senses.

It finishes with a facial, a simultaneous head and foot ritual.

There is also a swimming pool and fitness centre.

Don’t Miss

Take a peek at the Bechstein grand piano, dating back to 1895, that has been reinterpreted by Baldi as art and is on display outside the La Scala ballroom.

There is also a custom-made, emerald green Baldi Monumental clock that weighs nearly 1000 kilos and stands three metres tall, taking pride of place in the main lobby and reflecting impeccably precise atomic time.