I spent a few days in China recently and wanted to submit a brief review of the FS Shanghai and St. Regis Beijing ... both were very good, neither perfect. As I've never stayed elsewhere in either city I can't offer comparisons but I hope these absolute opinions are still somewhat useful ...

Being a glass-half-empty kind of guy, I'll start with the problems. For the FS Shanghai, the biggest issues with the hotel are obvious - depending on the purpose of your visit, the location can probably be beaten by a number of other hotels, and the views, at least based on what I had and a few others I was traveling with reported, are uninspiring at best.

The good in Shanghai included extremely efficient and helpful service virtually across-the-board; there were a couple of instances of less-than-perfect execution (some slow service at breakfast, for example) but these were minor and uncommon. I was always greeted by name, and found the use of English by hotel staff to be at least adequate, and often surprisingly capable. Aside from the aforementioned slow service at one breakfast and some bacon in the "western breakfast" which was prepared in a definitely non-western manner, the meals (restaurant, room service, and catered event luncheons) were of an appropriately high quality. The workout facilities were well-tended and the equipment was modern, but it was actually fairly busy and having a larger variety of weight/resistance machines and more than one cross-training eliptical would be nice. I stayed in a Four Seasons Executive Suite which had a good layout and pretty standard FS feel to it although it seems like an upgrade to plasma TVs is overdue. All in all, a fairly positive experience and one pretty much in line with my impression of the global FS brand, although I would think that for some, if not many, the location would be problematic enough to warrant considering other options.

The downside for the St. Regis Beijing included some fairly serious issues with the room layout - the room in question being a Statesman Suite. First, the room lacks anyplace to put a decent-sized suitcase to unpack near the (otherwise well-done) walk-in closet. Secondly, the placement of the very large bureau means that upon entering the bedroom, attempting to get to one side of the bed means having to be careful not to bump either the bureau or the bed - this of course could be remedied by a narrower piece of furniture and a correspondingly narrower TV. (Like Shanghai, the St. Regis has not yet gone to a plasma/flat-screen TV). The views from my room were decent (of the surrounding neighborhood - other high-rises and embassies, mostly) but nothing thrilling.

The so-called "butler" service was efficient and helpful with standard requests such as pressing clothes, delivering messages, etc.; when I informed them that the thermostat in my room was making a clicking sound which was sort of annoying (but was otherwise working) they promptly replaced it with a brand-new unit. The hotel breakfast was fine (adequate but overall not quite to the quality of the FS) but they did prepare a catered off-site lunch for our group which was truly superb. Overall I would say that it was somewhat colder than the FS Shanghai and that the lower-level staff spoke less English; there was also the general sense beyond language that while the staff was trying, they were less polished than at the FS.

The workout room and pool are in the adjacent building - connected via an indoor walkway, but a decent stroll; all things being equal I prefer not to meander through marble halls and through a hotel lobby dripping sweat. However, the upside of the location is that they have a huge amount of space - the pool is huge, and in a beautiful glass-roofed area, while the workout room is very large and extremely well-provisioned.

My sense of Beijing's layout, based on my very brief time there, is that there are downsides and upsides to where the various hotels are depending on the purposes of your trip, but that the St. Regis was not substantially disadvantaged in this regard.

I would think if I were going back to either city I would probably try out one of the competing properties; in Shanghai, simply as a matter of convenience due to location, and in Beijing, because while I like a good workout, I find it hard to believe that the competing venues don't offer a more compelling product in many of the other areas ...

Anyway, I hope this helps.