Innere Stadt / Am Hof

Park Hyatt Vienna

★★★★★

Park Hyatt Vienna occupies one of the finest buildings in the Old Town, a grand early twentieth-century bank headquarters on Am Hof, the largest square in the inner city, and it opened in 2014 as the first Hyatt hotel in Austria. The conversion kept the building's marble, high ceilings and monumental staircases and turned its spaces into a hotel of quiet, contemporary luxury. The former banking hall is now The Bank Brasserie and Bar, a dramatic room of columns and brass serving breakfast, lunch and dinner with a brasserie menu and cocktails, with a private dining room and a chef's table. The Living Room serves whisky, cognac and cigars, the Lounge offers light meals and Viennese pastries, and the Café Am Hof, opening onto the square, is a proper Viennese café with coffee specialities and homemade cakes. Downstairs, the Arany Spa is one of the best hotel spas in the city, with a 15-metre indoor pool, six treatment suites including one for couples, a sauna, a steam bath and a large fitness area. The rooms are among the largest in Vienna, with a calm palette, high ceilings, generous marble bathrooms with deep tubs and separate showers, and many suites, up to a spacious presidential suite. Service follows the Park Hyatt model, discreet and personal rather than formal. The location is excellent for a first visit or a shopping trip: the Goldenes Quartier, Vienna's luxury shopping street, is next door, the Hofburg and the Graben are a few minutes' walk away, and St Stephens Cathedral is ten minutes on foot. Rates sit at the top of the market with the Sacher and the city's other grand hotels; the difference is style, with the Park Hyatt offering contemporary calm and a pool rather than nineteenth-century grandeur.

The building and its spaces: walking into the Park Hyatt feels like walking into the bank it once was, with a monumental entrance, marble and gilded details, and the sense of permanence that bankers wanted to convey. The Bank Brasserie, in the old banking hall, is the heart of the hotel, a light-filled, high-ceilinged space popular with locals for lunch and dinner. The Café Am Hof is a welcome addition, with tables on one of the Old Town's most beautiful squares, which hosts one of the city's Advent markets in winter.

Rooms and spa: standard rooms are large by any European standard and quiet, many overlooking Am Hof or the surrounding streets, and suites add living rooms and dressing areas. The Arany Spa is the reason many guests choose the hotel, especially in winter: the indoor pool, sauna and steam bath are a fine end to a day of museums, and the spa suites offer massages and beauty treatments. The fitness centre is unusually large for a city-centre hotel.

Location and value: Am Hof sits between the Hofburg and the Freyung, with the U3 at Herrengasse a few minutes away and Stephansplatz within easy walking distance. The surrounding streets of the Golden Quarter, the Kohlmarkt and the Graben are Vienna's most elegant shopping area, and some of the best restaurants and cafés in the city are around the corner. Choose the Park Hyatt for a luxury stay with a contemporary feel, a serious spa and a quiet, central address; choose the Sacher instead if old-world atmosphere and opera views are the priority.