Sogong-dong (Myeongdong)

THE GRAND LOTTE SEOUL

★★★★★

THE GRAND LOTTE SEOUL (called Lotte Hotel Seoul until August 2026) is the flagship of Korea's largest hotel group and one of the city's landmark addresses, opened in 1979 in Sogong-dong, where downtown's business district meets the shopping streets of Myeongdong. It is a very large hotel, spread across a main tower and an executive tower, with a broad spectrum of rooms from straightforward deluxe rooms to club floors and grand suites, and it has been renovated in stages over the years so that the newer floors feel contemporary and light. Its location is its strongest selling point. The hotel is physically connected to the Lotte Department Store main branch and its duty-free floors, and to Euljiro 1-ga Station on Line 2, the circle line that reaches Hongdae, Gangnam, Jamsil and the DDP. Step out of the door and Myeongdong's cosmetics flagships and evening food carts are a few minutes away; Deoksugung Palace, Seoul Plaza and City Hall are just across the road; the Cheonggyecheon stream starts a short walk north; and the Namsan cable car is an uphill stroll to the south. The hotel has the full range of facilities you would expect of a big five-star: multiple restaurants covering Korean, Japanese, Chinese and international cuisine, a buffet that is a weekend favorite with Seoul families, bars and lounges, a fitness club with a swimming pool, and extensive banqueting spaces that host some of the city's grandest weddings and events. For many travelers, it is the archetypal central Seoul hotel: practical, comfortable and supremely well connected.

The size of the hotel shapes the experience. Lotte Hotel Seoul is busy, with tour groups, business travelers, conference delegates and wedding parties passing through its lobbies, and it can feel less intimate than smaller luxury hotels. On the other hand, service is efficient, the room choice is enormous, and for families or groups it is easy to find connecting rooms or larger options. Shopping-focused travelers love the direct link to the department store and duty-free, and it is hard to beat the convenience of stepping into the subway without going outside in winter cold or summer rain.

It pays to choose the right room category. The executive tower and the renovated floors of the main tower are the ones to aim for, and club-level rooms include lounge access that can offset the cost of breakfasts and evening drinks. Ask for a high floor; views stretch over the downtown towers toward Namsan or Bugaksan. Because rates vary enormously with demand, the hotel can be good value outside peak periods and expensive during major conferences and holidays.

Compared with its neighbors, Lotte Hotel Seoul is the all-rounder: more central than the Shilla, larger and busier than the Four Seasons, more traditional than the L7 lifestyle hotels nearby. For a first trip that mixes palaces, Myeongdong, Namsan and shopping, it ticks every box, and for anyone arriving with heavy luggage, the airport limousine buses stop close by.