Belmond is not a hotel company in the conventional sense. It is, as its own literature occasionally acknowledges, a collection — assembled over four decades by a company that began as a single Peruvian hotel owner in 1976 and has grown into the custodian of some of the most historically significant properties in the world. The portfolio includes hotels, yes — but also the Venice Simplon-Orient-Express, the British Pullman, the Royal Scotsman, and the Hiram Bingham train to Machu Picchu; the Douro Valley river cruises; the Burma river boats. It is the only luxury hospitality company in the world that can arrange a journey from London to Istanbul by private train, continue by river boat through Myanmar, and place the traveler in a Peruvian colonial monastery within walking distance of the archaeological capital of the Inca empire. Understanding Belmond requires understanding that it is not competing with Marriott or Hilton for the same traveler. It is operating in a category it largely invented.
The Belmond Philosophy: Place First
Every Belmond property exists because of where it is, not despite where it is. The Hotel Cipriani is on the Giudecca in Venice because Venice is incomparable and the Giudecca has the only swimming pool in the historic centre. The Sanctuary Lodge is at Machu Picchu because Machu Picchu is the most significant archaeological site in the Americas and the Sanctuary Lodge is the only hotel within the site's boundaries. The Hotel Caruso is in Ravello because the views from the Amalfi Coast's highest point are the finest in Italy. None of these properties would be interesting at a different location; all of them are extraordinary because the location is irreplaceable.
This location-first philosophy produces a specific kind of guest experience: not the experience of a globally consistent luxury standard applied to a local setting, but the experience of a specific place — its history, its cuisine, its landscape — mediated by a level of service and physical environment that makes the place accessible rather than overwhelming. The Belmond experience is always primarily the place; the hotel is the frame through which the place is encountered.
Italy: The Heart of the Collection
Italy contains the largest concentration of Belmond properties and the ones that most clearly express the collection's philosophy. They share a characteristic: each occupies a position — physical, historical, or cultural — that no competitor could replicate.
Belmond Hotel Cipriani, Venice
On the Giudecca — across the Giudecca Canal from the Doge's Palace, accessible only by the hotel's private launch, with the only swimming pool in historic Venice set in a garden of extraordinary beauty — the Hotel Cipriani has been the finest address in Venice since 1958. The hotel was founded by Giuseppe Cipriani (whose other contribution to Venetian culture is Harry's Bar, inventor of the Bellini cocktail and the Carpaccio dish) and has been the preferred base of every significant cultural figure who has stayed in Venice since: Hemingway, Truman Capote, the Aga Khan, virtually every head of state who has visited the Republic. The Cip's Club restaurant, built on a floating pontoon over the lagoon, is the finest outdoor dining position in Venice. Preferred partner perks at Belmond Hotel Cipriani.
Belmond Hotel Splendido, Portofino
In Portofino — the village that defines the Italian Riviera's visual identity — the Splendido occupies a former Benedictine monastery on the hillside above the harbour, with a view that has been painted, photographed, and described more often than almost any hotel position in the world. The hotel's history as the preferred destination of the 20th century's cultural and social elite — Rex Harrison, Elizabeth Taylor, Humphrey Bogart, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor — makes it the most storied address on the Mediterranean coast. The terrace is the evening's social centre of the entire Ligurian Riviera; the Splendido Mare on the harbour below serves as the hotel's beach club. Preferred partner perks at Belmond Hotel Splendido.
Belmond Hotel Caruso, Ravello
In Ravello — the village 365 metres above the Amalfi Coast whose gardens and views produce the most elevated perspective on the Mediterranean available from any inhabited settlement in Italy — the Hotel Caruso occupies an 11th-century palace of extraordinary physical beauty, with an infinity pool whose edge appears to dissolve into the sea 365 metres below. Wagner composed part of Parsifal in Ravello; Gore Vidal lived here for 30 years; DH Lawrence, Virginia Woolf, and Graham Greene all wrote here. The hotel is the physical embodiment of what Ravello's particular combination of altitude, history, and beauty can deliver at the finest level. Preferred partner perks at Belmond Hotel Caruso.
Belmond Villa San Michele, Fiesole
In Fiesole — the Etruscan hill town above Florence whose views of the Arno valley produce the definitive long perspective on the Tuscan landscape — Villa San Michele occupies a 15th-century Franciscan monastery whose façade was designed by Michelangelo. The 46 rooms and suites within the monastery cloister and the terraced gardens, with Florence's Duomo and Giotto's bell tower visible from the loggia, make it the finest monastic hotel conversion in Italy. Preferred partner perks at Belmond Villa San Michele.
Belmond Grand Hotel Timeo, Taormina, Sicily
Above Taormina — with the Greek Theatre visible from the hotel's garden terrace and Mount Etna's volcanic cone on the horizon — the Grand Hotel Timeo is the finest hotel in Sicily and one of the most historically significant in Italy. The hotel has been in continuous operation since 1873; Goethe described Taormina from this hilltop; D.H. Lawrence wrote parts of Lady Chatterley's Lover in a house visible from the terrace. Preferred partner perks at Belmond Grand Hotel Timeo.
Peru: The Machu Picchu Portfolio
Belmond's Peruvian portfolio is the most concentrated expression of the collection's "place-first" philosophy: five properties in a single country, arranged around the Inca trail and the Sacred Valley, designed to provide the finest possible base for the experience of the Andean archaeological landscape.
Belmond Sanctuary Lodge, Machu Picchu
The only hotel within Machu Picchu's boundaries — adjacent to the Inca citadel's entrance, accessible only after the 90-minute bus journey from Aguas Calientes below — the Sanctuary Lodge provides what no other accommodation can: the citadel at dawn before the day-trip crowds arrive, at dusk after they depart, and under the moonlight on clear nights. The 31 rooms are not the finest in the Belmond collection; the position is the most significant. Preferred partner perks at Belmond Sanctuary Lodge.
Belmond Hotel Monasterio, Cusco
In the former Seminary of San Antonio Abad in Cusco — a 16th-century colonial building around a courtyard with a 300-year-old cedar tree — the Hotel Monasterio is the finest hotel in Peru's most significant city and the natural base for the Sacred Valley, Machu Picchu, and the Andean archaeological circuit. The hotel's altitude (3,400 metres) makes it the highest luxury hotel in the Belmond collection; its enriched oxygen system (piped to all rooms) is the most sophisticated altitude acclimatisation program available in any Peruvian hotel. Preferred partner perks at Belmond Hotel Monasterio.
The United Kingdom & Europe
Belmond Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons, Oxfordshire
Raymond Blanc's two-Michelin-star country house hotel and cookery school in Great Milton, Oxfordshire — the property that established the modern British country house hotel as a culinary destination — is the most celebrated hotel restaurant in England and one of the most influential in the world. The 32 rooms and suites in the 15th-century manor and its gardens, the cookery school that attracts students from across the world, and the kitchen garden that supplies one of the most ambitious restaurant programs in the UK make Le Manoir a destination that exists entirely independently of its hotel category. Preferred partner perks at Belmond Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons.
Belmond La Residencia, Mallorca
In the village of Deià on Mallorca's northwest coast — the village where Robert Graves lived for 50 years and wrote I, Claudius, where the landscape of terraced olive groves descending to the Mediterranean has attracted artists since the 19th century — La Residencia is two converted 16th-century manor houses with 67 rooms and suites. The combination of the Tramuntana mountains, the Mediterranean light, and the village's 300-year history as an artists' colony produces an environment unlike any other in the Mediterranean luxury hotel market. Preferred partner perks at Belmond La Residencia.
Africa & Beyond
Belmond Mount Nelson Hotel, Cape Town
In the gardens below Table Mountain — the distinctive pink façade that has been Cape Town's most recognisable hotel address since 1899, where the Afternoon Tea in the Lady Phillips restaurant is the finest in the southern hemisphere — the Mount Nelson has been the social centre of Cape Town's cultural and political life for 125 years. Nelson Mandela held his first post-prison press conference here. The gardens, the pool, and the veranda facing the mountain make it the most atmospheric luxury hotel in Africa. Preferred partner perks at Belmond Mount Nelson Hotel.
The Belmond Journey: Trains, Rivers & Beyond
The Venice Simplon-Orient-Express — the restored 1920s carriages that travel between London, Paris, and Venice — is the most celebrated of Belmond's journey experiences and the one that has defined the brand's identity as something broader than a hotel collection. The cabin cars with their inlaid woodwork and original Art Deco fittings, the dining cars that serve a formal dinner service as the Alps pass in the window, and the arrival at Venice Santa Lucia at dawn are experiences that no conventional hotel can replicate because they happen in motion through the European landscape.
The Hiram Bingham — the train between Cusco and Aguas Calientes (the gateway to Machu Picchu), named for the Yale historian who brought the citadel to international attention in 1911 — provides the finest transit to Machu Picchu available. The Belmond Douro Rabelo river cruises through Portugal's wine country, and the Eastern & Oriental Express through the Malay Peninsula, complete a journey portfolio with no equivalent in the luxury hospitality industry. Contact WhataHotel! for Belmond journey booking through the Bellini Club preferred partner channel.