Introduction I am generally not a big fan of the IHG hotel chain because the elite loyalty benefits are weak relative to other chains such as Marriott, Hyatt, Hilton, and in Asia specifically, Accor as well. Kimpton Maa-Lai Bangkok opened back in October and I was curious to try it despite the uncompetitive elite benefits. Our stay turned out to be a very pleasant surprise and I am glad I gave this hotel a chance: service was excellent and dare I say, better than at the new Four Seasons Bangkok, and the room I ended up with was quite nice and bigger than what many other hotels call suites. The fact that I normally have a negative slant on IHG hotels and yet I am writing a glowing review of this property should be quite telling. Location Kimpton is in a fairly convenient part of the city, in a new development shared with Sindhorn Kempinski, in fact both hotels have the same owner. It’s on a small street between Ratchadamri Road (Grand Hyatt, Waldorf Astoria, Anantara Siam, and St.Regis) and Wittayu Road (Athenee, Indigo, and Conrad) so a heavy area filled with 5-star hotels. Kimpton is about a 10-minute walk from the Chit Lom BTS sky train station. Room From memory at the time I booked my reservation, I think the rate was the same for the entry level room (King Deluxe) and the 1-Bedroom Apartment so I chose the latter. I am a bit confused because now when I look at future room rates on the website, the 1-bdr apt no longer seems to be listed. I got upgraded as Platinum Ambassador to the Grand Premium room; because of my confusion about my original room type I cannot say for sure whether this was in fact a 1-category upgrade or a 2-category upgrade. The entry level room is 48 sqm which is already quite big for a standard room, and interestingly the second room type (Premium) is much bigger at 77 sqm yet cash rates are only marginally higher. The same can be said for the Grand Premium room which I got: 87 sqm but only a small extra over the standard room. So my upgrade was material space-wise, but not cash-wise. Many other hotel chains are generous with suite upgrades and at Kimpton I did not get a suite: the Grand Premium room is one short of the junior suite (108 sqm). That said, this is only semantics: my room would be called a suite by almost every other hotel because the living room was completely separate from the bedroom and bathroom. In addition, in most other hotels the standard suites are in the range 60-80 sqm and therefore smaller than our room at Kimpton. I will not get hung up on the naming conventions and whether my upgrade was stingy or not: bottom line is I had a bigger and newer room than what generous hotel chains give me, so the typically more modest IHG upgrades ended up being a complete non-issue for me. The room was a fairly good quality build, one step above Park Hyatt which normally does not impress with hardware (except their bathroom) and one step below Waldorf Astoria. Comparing to St.Regis is a bit more difficult, I would say Kimpton is lower than StR used to be when StR was a brand new hotel but since StR now has some wear & tear I would pick the room at Kimpton now compared to standard suites at StR.To be balanced in my review, I must highlight a few points which make me rate this room good but not great: (1) I wish it had hardwood floors rather than carpet, (2) Water pressure in the hand shower was fine but from the rain shower it was weak, and (3) To be considered a top notch suite I am generally looking for 1.5 bath but this room only has the main bathroom. I am assuming that some of the larger rooms (which they call suites) have 1.5 bath. Otherwise I did not have much to complain about, the air conditioning was strong, the bed was comfortable and they delivered a special pillow order to our room before our arrival as per my e-mail exchange with staff before we arrived at the hotel. This hotel is pet-friendly and since we do not have a pet I was not sure it would be a good fit for us, but they limit pet owners to rooms on floors 7 and 8 only. This is a high-rise building and we had a room on a high floor so there were no sanitary concerns in our room and obviously no noise issues either since any potential barking dogs were not anywhere near our room. Service I had never stayed in a Kimpton brand hotel before – somehow I thought the hotel would be competing with W and Sofitel SO, perhaps because of the style. However, in large part due to service levels, I think Kimpton is far more akin to Park Hyatt, St.Regis, and Waldorf Astoria. For newer hotels I tend to excuse service hiccups such as those we had at Four Seasons one week prior to our stay at Kimpton, but the service at Kimpton was thoroughly excellent at every interaction with staff. Not only it started on the right foot before our arrival with the e-mail exchange mentioned above, but also at the hotel the service was great with staff at the front door and reception addressing us by name regularly, and similarly service was excellent by the pool during happy hour and in the restaurant during breakfast. The high level of service was not because the hotel was almost empty and staff not busy, in fact Saturday and Sunday mornings the restaurant was fairly crowded (unlike during week days). Not only it was impressive that staff remembered our names and room number as soon as we stepped off the elevator as early as the second morning (we are not regulars at this hotel!), but it was clear that staff were always trying to anticipate guest needs and address them proactively rather than wait for requests. I could make a long list of how staff were client-centric, for example at the noodle soup station in almost every hotel when you order you have to wait for your bowl to be ready but instead at Kimpton staff informed us that we could go back to our table and they would bring our order. Once they saw my pregnant wife a bit uncomfortable on her chair they brought a cushion to support her back. Staff made the rounds in the restaurant to ask clients if they were happy with their stay. When guests were leaving the restaurant, staff at the entrance would step ahead to open and hold the elevator door for customers. During happy hour the refills kept coming without us having to ask for anything. Our next destination after Kimpton was Kempinski next door and I wanted to check-in there before we checked out from Kimpton. When staff saw me heading to Kempinski they insisted on walking with me and my suitcase next door to their close cousin hotel. I could go on and on, all these little details were non-stop during our stay. To conclude on service the GM paid us a visit during happy hour on the day we arrived to introduce himself. Since he is making himself visible and available for guests, he is probably setting the right tone for the staff. Dining Regarding breakfast itself it was a combo of buffet and a la carte. There were a few interesting dishes and drinks with a good balance of western and Asian choices, there was even a mini Arabic station. To mitigate the risk of covid at the buffet with many guests sharing spoons and thongs, the hotel made plastic gloves available for all guests. The design of the restaurant was quite inviting and attractive as well. Breakfast was supposed to end at 10:30am but they were not rushing guests at all, many times food was still available after 11am unlike hotels which take food away on the dot.Happy hour was 5-6pm with free-flow drinks near the pool. It was available to all guests (not limited to Platinum Ambassador guests) but surprisingly it was fairly quiet even though the hotel was not low occupancy on weekends. There will also be a Club Lounge on the 30th floor but it’s not open at the moment and it is not clear what access rules will be, in fact I am not seeing Club rooms for sale on the website yet. Hotels in other chains provide free executive lounge access which is usually not the case at IHG, but on this aspect once again since I had decent drinks in a location which was not overcrowded, I don’t feel like I was missing out on the elite treatment. We ordered room service a couple of times and while the dishes were good, what was the most remarkable was how generous the portions were – bigger than most hotel room service choices offered by competitors. Gym This being a new hotel the gym had new and modern equipment as can be expected. I liked the bright red machines which were in contrast with the more sober looking equipment at other hotels. Wifi As if I did not have enough positive points to mention about this hotel already, wifi worked great and was one of the fastest I have seen in Bangkok with speeds of almost 150 Mbps both download and upload. Overall Overall it’s safe to say that Kimpton easily exceeded my expectations and I can highly recommend it. Since I have stayed and reviewed almost 40 different hotels in Bangkok in the last few years, I would like to think that I am a decent judge of the local market, however opinions seem to have been mixed so far regarding this hotel, so take it for what it’s worth but in my opinion Kimpton punches well above its weight and any service or hardware issues they might have experienced in the first couple of months seem to be far in the rearview mirror, at least based on my experience from our stay. This hotel has been a revelation for me and seems to be a well-kept secret at least for now. The IHG program can make hotels less competitive for people who stay at many chains, but at least this time I was able to take advantage of the current third night free promotion and IHG Luxury Collection benefits (100 USD credit and free breakfast) which mitigated some drawbacks and made our stay good value for the money. Perhaps in different circumstances the deals will not be the same but at least for this stay I had very little to complain about. It will be hard for me to overlook Kimpton as a good option in Bangkok for my future stays despite the high level of competition in the city.