To the Victorian Capital what Capella is to Sydney, The Ritz-Carlton Melbourne registers as the city’s most ambitious new hotel opening in nearly a decade.
Only the second property in Australia from the renowned American luxury brand — the other offers an altogether different feel, on the banks of Perth’s Swan River — this Marriott-backed sky palace sets itself apart from local competition in a handful of brash, instantaneously palpable ways. An excellent signature restaurant and eye-bending infinity pool are just some of the obvious talking points.
Undeniably: this new luxury hotel from one of the world’s biggest hospitality portfolios scores massive points for style and scale, but does that translate into longevity with local Melburnians?
Explore our full Ritz-Carlton Melbourne review below to find out.
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Hotel Review: The Ritz-Carlton Melbourne
The Ritz-Carlton, Melbourne
Excellent
89/100
SCOREPROS
- Stylish, produce-driven dining
- Best views in the city
- Plentiful privacy
CONS
- Hotel’s scale sometimes gets away from it
Set the scene for us — where’s the hotel located?
A source of much debate amongst Melburnians and Australia’s gilded business travellers, this outpost of the Ritz-Carlton is located at the western edge of the Melbourne CBD.
Part of the multi-billion-dollar precinct that is West Side Place, The Ritz-Carlton Melbourne’s immediate neighbours include Marvel Stadium, Southern Cross Station, and an array of Victorian Law Courts. The Docklands are a comfortable 15-minute stroll away.
For a certain kind of Ritz-Carlton regular, the property’s relative remoteness from the city’s manicured boulevards and European architecture may seem a little perplexing. This, however, is a tentative criticism.
As an infrequent Melbourne visitor myself, I found the process of navigating back to the ‘Paris End’ of town fairly painless: sped along greatly by frequent tram services (that also happen to be free when you travel inside the City Circle).
Design-wise, what’s your first impression?
Described by the team at interiors firm Bar Studio (also behind the fit-out at Capella Sydney) as a “deeply Melburnian” project, the look here, throughout social spaces and various interstitial areas, reflects Ritz-Carlton’s commitment to building hotels with a site-specific flavour.
Even before you’re whizzed up to the Sky Lobby in one of the hotel’s ultra-fast elevators — it takes 45 seconds to ascend to the 80th floor — the entryway at street level acts as a tantalising preview of what to expect upstairs.
An imposing, metal-clad staircase evokes the history of the Victorian Gold Rush, while there are a range of installations commissioned from First Nations artists, such as Christian Thompson AO and Reko Rennie, who have a lived/ancestral connection to the surrounding region.
One other fantastic ambient detail (there are, frankly, almost too many to mention) is the wall-to-wall water feature that greets guests on the 64th floor. Paying subtle tribute to the famous Collins Street Wonderwall (2011), it’s an ingenious bit of environmental mood-building — tuned to the space that encloses the hotel’s pool, spa, and wellness facilities.
Ok so it’s a beautiful hotel, but what are the amenities like?
“Impressive”, and then some. Aside from the aforementioned infinity pool and wellness facilities, the big-time lure at The Ritz-Carlton Melbourne is its private club lounge — located on the 79th floor.
An established part of the brand’s DNA, this “hotel within a hotel” experience is largely consistent with what you’ll find at Ritz-Carlton properties in Tokyo, Shanghai, New York, and various other international locations. (No level of Bonvoy Elite status, it should be said, will secure you complimentary access.)
During our flying visit, we didn’t get the chance to rigorously test-drive this particular Ritz-Carlton Club, but for completeness, guests willing to pay a premium can expect the following:
- Dedicated guest services, including check-in and concierge;
- 5 daily culinary presentations, curated by Executive Chef Michael Greenlaw;
- Additional in-room amenities, including garment pressing and an “elevated” turndown service.
Melbourne’s a big foodie city — does the hotel deliver on the wine & dine front?
Absolutely. In fact, I’d go so far as to identify the hotel’s F&B program as the high point of my stay. Vaguely in our previous refrain about location, it’s scarily easy to slip into the various modes of dining that The Ritz-Carlton Melbourne has to offer, all without feeling the urge to venture across town.
A large part of this wonderfully cocooning feeling of hospitality comes down to Atria — the hotel’s signature fine dining destination, overseen by Vue du Monde alumnus Michael Greenlaw.
Despite the fact that Atria also hosts the majority of the hotel’s breakfasters (Club guests aside), the combination of excellent white-tablecloth service and expressive, produce-powered cooking mean that it’s worth tucking in for dinner, or the mother of all business lunches.
At $95, the new three-course lunch menu is especially noteworthy, and you can always put the pennies you’ve saved toward a glass of characterful French, Japanese, or local Victorian wines (dispensed via Coravin) by Head Sommelier, Sean Lam.
Cameo, the hotel’s signature lounge & bar, slips effortlessly into the role of clubby, high-end watering hole. An exhaustive, well-resourced backbar means that drinkers here can pretty much order any serve popularised in the past “100 years of drinking culture”: whether that’s a straight-up Old Fashioned or one of the venue’s signature ‘Fine & Rare’ cocktails.
If you can, we recommend requesting a seat near the main service bar; which gives you a front seat to all of the bartending action and gun barrel views of the Yarra River.
In a nutshell, how would describe the rooms?
Big, bright, and discrete in their decadence.
Signature Ritz-Carlton suite withstanding, there are about 257 rooms to hunker down in. All come equipped with electric blackouts, bedside control units, and double vanities.
For this review, I spent a serviceable amount of time in one of the mid-tier ‘Premier’ layouts.
A slender chaise at the window’s edge encourages you to bask in what is surely Melbourne CBD’s most elevated view (mine happens to be of Port Philip Bay), but turning inward, there’s a lot to like about the space too — a patter of suede, timber, and gleaming metallic tones.
Fortunately, the 44 sqm size factor is more than a soundbite. Having that sort of square footage at its disposal means Bar Studio has been able to divide these Premier Rooms into various smaller quadrants, without undercutting their overall sense of scale.
If anything, the Calacatta shower/bathtub combo, open-plan workspace and wardrobe (virtually big enough to be a walk-in) hammer home the hotel’s impressive foundations.
Any notes on service?
This is one area in which The Ritz-Carlton Melbourne’s formidable scale appears, occasionally, to work against it: compounded somewhat by the fact that nightly rates here start at around $600.
With 17 floors of guestrooms, event space, a spa, and three discrete F&B venues to cover, there is sometimes a disconnect between the property itself and the personnel who populate it. Case in point: the occasional bit of mess in the elevators, and a request for housekeeping to turn over our guestroom that required two consecutive calls in order to action.
Admittedly, the hotel only started taking reservations in earnest last June, and the service is of a sufficiently high calibre elsewhere — notably the dining venues and concierge — that we’re eager to put these lapses down to growing pains. Even the most venerable 5-star hotel brands are, as it turns out, a human enterprise.
The Ritz-Carlton, Melbourne
Address: 650 Lonsdale Street, Melbourne VIC 3000
Contact: +61 3 9122 2888
The author stayed as a guest of The Ritz-Carlton Melbourne.
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