Flash, sexy and a resurgent star on the world travel scene, Rio de Janeiro is the sea-to-mountain metropolis with curves in all the right places.
Brazil’s second capital propels urban explorers to swoop up through jungle to Art-Deco world wonders or simply spend an entire week making like The Girl From Ipanema by sauntering through the much-fabled and utterly iconic beaches. Rio is also the launchpad to nearby island adventures and home to a burgeoning creative network of bohemian districts, South America’s finest galleries and a music lifestyle that defines the national mood.
The arrival point in Brazil that seduces you to stay, Rio reassures its renaissance with to-die-for hotels embodying all the pulse, glitz and rhapsody of this city with glamour at its soul. Like private clubs with signature scenes and personalities, these micro-resorts welcome with spellbinding views, Houdini concierges and hotel-logoed Havaianas (yes, they’re a thing here…).
The Grand Dame: Copacabana Palace, A Belmond Hotel
Among South America’s first and finest – and certainly one of the world’s most famous – hotels, the Copacabana Palace fuses all the history, style and starriness of its storied surrounds with the discretion and excellence of the Belmond stable. Staff here build relationships that feel like they’ve been established over decades rather than minutes and a fleet of multilingual drivers waits on standby outside. You want it? You got it! Despite being unabashedly the starriest hotel in South America it pulls off that Brazilian art of being both utterly relaxing and dazzlingly flash.
Jewel-like rooms and suites continue the provenance, with eye-catching vintage and contemporary Carioca art, antique rugs caressing polished wood floors, and starch Art Deco architecture and furniture the backdrop to sweeping views over Copacabana Beach. Generous turndown gifts are a nightly delight. Breakfast unfurls a buffet of dreams in the restaurant overlooking Avenida Atlantica or al fresco by the pool. From vegans to celiacs, everyone’s catered for: à la carte dishes educate with recipes from across the regions of Brazil and the world. Lunch and supper at Pergula restaurant is a sophisticated occasion, where flavours and textures sweep Carioca signatures, Amazonian delicacies and international dishes with a Brazilian twist, while Mee is the bijou Michelin-starred Pan Asian burnt orange dining room.
Boasting all the trappings of a luxury resort – swim and sunbathe around the centrepiece semi-Olympic sized pool, catch a show at the heritage in-house theatre, don your tennis whites for the rooftop court and cruise the Copacabana promenade on complementary bicycles. Curated daily experiences roam from guided nature hikes and beach-fit classes to hotel tours explaining the property’s hundred year provenance – from its flagship foundations as the first building on Copacabana Bay to the hall of fame featuring everyone from the world’s presidents and princesses to kings of empires and rock.
The Sultry Sojourn: Fasano Rio
Presiding over Ipanema beach, the flagship of Brazil’s first and only global luxury hotel empire effuses the sultry, smouldering and seductive style of Bossa Nova – the Rio de Janeiro musical form that provides the inspiration for Fasano. Designed by Philippe Starck, sinuous mid-century modern shapes and objets d’art soothe through the interiors. It’s sexy and a tad brooding – as every star should be. Each suite boasts a wraparound terrace and every room a balcony. Showstopping panoramic sea views extend from standalone centrepiece beds (some with, ooh-errr, overhead mirrors) to the crashing waves of Ipanema and Arpoador. The rooftop terrace welcomes with a sauna-backed aquamarine infinity pool and a seafood-centric bar menu. There are complementary surfboards and an indoor-outdoor breakfast café next to the spa. The concierge is like an encyclopaedia to the city.
The Breezy Beach Bolthole: Emiliano Hotel
Emiliano infuses all the cheery optimism of Copacabana into this bijoux bolthole. A modernist white facade announces the oceanfront property, an aesthetic that dominates from the vertical indoor gardens to the capacious bedrooms. Tech is intelligent – curtains open at the flick of a switch and there are Japanese loos. The nightly sweet turndown treats, complementary clothes pressing and shake-the-jet-lag mini massages please all. Book a sea-facing room for the quintessential Zona Sul hotel experience.
Wellness is care of the Amazon-inspired Santapele range, from in room to the spa. Everything is micro-luxe, artfully packed in and hidden away – from the cigar terrace to the library, techno gym overlooking sunrise paddleboarders and sea-view sauna to the rooftop infinity lap pool and sceney sun deck that’s a vibe unto itself. Guests comprise the extremes of low-key internationals and high-vibration South Americans over à la carte breakfasts around the centrepiece vertical garden. Invite friends up to the summit after 6pm for quintessential roof topping over seafood and cocktails in Rio de Janeiro.
Bohemian Boutique Hotel: Santa Teresa Hotel RJ – MGallery
Santa Teresa is the romantic Rio of yore; a highly bohemian character threads through the impossibly beautiful period mansion facades with art emblazoned across its ateliers and walls snaked by the iconic canary yellow Bonde. Santa Teresa Hotel M Gallery spans a former coffee farm at the district’s epicentre. Rooms are a rhapsody of four-poster beds and jungle views, scintillating panoramic cityscapes, standalone baths and original shutters. The Royal Suite has a grand piano and overlooks Christ the Redeemer. The magnanimous showpiece pool sits underneath Tereze restaurant – with its sophisticated modernist “Tropical Chic” interiors reason to visit here alone – and an art-filled bar and is backed by a scene-stealing spa with sound healing and complimentary massages for guests or those on day passes.
The Design Den: Chez Georges
If James Bond were to select a mansion to hideout after his Sugarloaf Mountain standoff with Jaws, this former home of a Brazilian architect might be the one. Chez Georges’ seven suites are accessed from the rainforest-backed lanes of Santa Teresa via a four-metre high door leading to a glass elevator ascending to panoramic hilltop views. A starkly modernist design encompasses brutalist concrete architecture and glass walls with floating beds, curling mezzanines and mid-century modern furniture overlooking a shimmering pool complete with hydrojets and vistas of Sugarloaf Mountain. Every room of this boutique bolthole has show-stopping views and outside space: to truly live like a Carioca queen you can commandeer the entire premises. It’s set in Santa Teresa which is becoming increasingly popular for its bohemian atmosphere, sublime bars, shopping, restaurants and proximity to the airport. It’s well placed for exploring the city’s main tourist attractions such as Christ the Redeemer, Sugarloaf Mountain, the Escadaria Selaron and Lapa Arches.
Lead image credit: Copacabana Palace, A Belmond Hotel
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