Park Hyatt Vienna

Vienna keeps its grandeur in its institutions, and this one used to hold money. The building on Am Hof was a bank, and the conversion has gone further here than in most: the vault is the pool. A 15-metre stretch of water set inside the old strong room, with the masonry still all around it, is the most memorable thing any hotel in the city offers.

The rest is calibrated to match. Rooms work in wood, marble and mother-of-pearl, warm rather than austere, with bathrooms that keep the tub and the rain shower apart. The Bank Brasserie & Bar occupies the former banking hall, keeps its own entrance on Bognergasse and runs an open kitchen in full view of the room. Outside, the Golden Quarter and the old town begin at the door.

Am Hof, and the old town

Am Hof puts the hotel inside Vienna’s historic centre, with the Golden Quarter’s boutiques immediately behind it. From here the city is walkable in the way it is meant to be, with the palaces, the museums, the coffee houses and the opera at a distance that never justifies a taxi. The building contributes to the streetscape rather than borrowing from it, which is unusual for a hotel of this size.

Wood, marble and mother-of-pearl

The rooms are unusually warm for a Park Hyatt, using wood, marble and mother-of-pearl to soften a building designed to look incorruptible. Bathrooms keep the tub and the rain shower apart, which after a day on Viennese pavements is the correct arrangement. Suites separate living from sleeping properly, and the named View categories point the windows at the old town rather than at a light well.

A brasserie in the banking hall

The Bank Brasserie & Bar has the former banking hall to work with and wastes none of it. The open kitchen runs in full view, the room keeps its own entrance on Bognergasse and the menu holds to brasserie logic, which is the right register beneath a ceiling of this size. Below, Arany Spa turns the vault into a 15-metre pool and a set of treatment rooms, cool and quiet under all that stone.