The opening of the Ritz-Carlton in Hong Kong, which has an alfresco rooftop bar 490 metres above sea level, will be the tallest hotel in the world is still about six months away.
However, the hotel already has 20 bookings for wedding receptions and it is getting six or more inquiries per day.
“People book much further out here than in other parts of the world. With weddings, it’s partly to do with securing special locations on auspicious dates, but it’s also a sign of the confidence people have here,” said Ritz-Carlton’s regional general manager Mark DeCocinis.
“The Asian hotel market has come back stronger and more quickly than other parts of the world – and China is leading the way,” he added.
Several luxury hotels have been emerging around the world. The Armani Hotel Dubai opened in April at Burj Khalifa, the world’s tallest building. However, the rate of growth has been strongest in Asia.
The region’s hotel boom is not as easy as just build it. The race to build new hotels in Beijing during the 2008 Olympic Games contributed to a slump in average rooms and many were emptied when the games were over.
In Shanghai, where the 2010 World Expo opened recently, almost 20 upmarket hotels will open, based on an online database Tophotelprojects.com. The number of new rooms has raised concerns of a potential oversupply.
It is a risk hotel executives are willing to take. Even though most of China’s large population struggles to make ends meet, the country is becoming one of the largest markets in the world for high-end services and goods.
According to a study conducted by McKinsey in 2009, China will have over four million wealthy households by 2012. It is defined in the country’s case as having an income of more than 250,000 yuan (S$51,000) per year. Only Britain, Japan and United States will have more wealthy households by 2012.
While business is languishing elsewhere, hotel revenue has been rallying in Asia and is now not far below where it was before the crisis, hotel executives said.
“We’re not quite back to where we were two years ago – but we’re close,” said Robert Murray, head of the greater China business of the French hotel giant Accor.