St Regis Osaka: incredible dining and service even amidst a few issues

For this Japan trip to celebrate our 8th wedding anniversary, we tried to maxmize enjoyment of my SPG Platinum Ambassador elite status while it lasted. With the coming merger of the Marriott-Starwood loyalty programs expected in late 2018 or 2019, I didn't know if Ambassador status and benefits would continue. (As of April 18, the new Marriott loyalty program was announced and will continue to offer Ambassador service.) 

We finished our trip with 3 nights at the St Regis Osaka, following 3 nights at the Prince Gallery Tokyo Kioicho (Luxury Collection), 5 nights at the Suiran Kyoto (Luxury Collection), and 2 nights at the Ritz Carlton Kyoto. Fortunately, I booked while it still was Category 6 and cost only 20K points per night at lower season--but I booked an upgraded Grand Deluxe Room category for 21.5K points per night, a total of only 64.5K points for our 3 nights.

I saw that there were no available suites several weeks before our arrival, so I knew we had little chance for my Suite Night Awards to go through. They didn't go through. Oh well, you win some, and you lose some.

The St Regis is a beautiful and reasonably sized luxury hotel with plush interiors and a beautiful terrace garden overlooking the city. It is located in a tall office building very near the central business district of Osaka. It has 160 total rooms, including 12 suites--an unusually small proportion of suites for a St. Regis, actually.

Walking into the small ground floor lobby:

The ground floor Rue D'Or restaurant, serving breakfast (during the n ew breakfast space renovation), lunch, and dinner.

Bathroom that blew my mind:

Rue D'Or second floor, more in line with what the restaurant plans for downstairs after its renovation:

The elevators go up to the 12th floor lobby.

Reception:Rooftop deck garden:

Outdoor terrace bar area:

La Veduta restaurant:

Elevators from the 12th floor lobby to the 27th floor of hotel:

Iridium spa and fitness center on 14th floor:

Hallways on 26th floor:

The hotel was nicely appointed and felt luxurious--but felt a bit dated overall. It could use a refresh, especially after we saw the new Conrad Osaka! No wonder they are refurbishing the new breakfast space and creating a new Japanese restaurant in the coming months. 

Check in was extremely smooth and almost immediate, as we arrived by private car from the RC Kyoto to be met by the guest relations associate. Unfortunately, the driver was having trouble getting signal for his credit card machine to work, so after a surprising amount of time waiting for the driver to get paid, the hotel guest relations associate offered to have the hotel pay him cash and add the total to our bill. Nice touch.

The associate accompanied us up to the 12th floor lobby and straight to our room on the 126th floor. We bypassed many staff along the way, all of whom greeted us by name. More impressive personal service.

We were quickly checked in from our room. She apologized for the lack of suite upgrade but noted they were at full occupancy and with many wedding parties in house--which I already knew. She did note that we'd been upgraded to the highest room category with the better view.

Our Skyline Grand Deluxe Room was fine. Nothing really impressive, but nothing too probletic, either. It just felt a little dated and worn arounnd the edges.

Butler's closet, which we used almost immediately to get our slacks and shirts pressed:

We had a Toto toilet again, but definitely an older model. And gain no motion functionality like we enjoyed at the Prince Gallery in Tokyo.

The closet was definitely small. I was delighted to have butler unpacking service so I didn't have to figure it out!

A niche held a bar/wardrobe:

We had a lovely welcome gift and note from my Ambassador, followed by an anniversary gift from my Ambassador and the hotel, too.

The room was actually more spacious than it looked, though the bathroom was a bit on the smaller side. The shower was spacious, but the closet was small. Anf the air con worked wonders; it was so cool, I rarely even used the fan, but appreciated having it just in case!

The view was excellent, too.

All in all, not a bad room. But not a great room, either. The hotel could use a room renovation/refresh...stat.

Service is clearly where the St Regis shines--and shines easily above all the other pretencers to the throne in Osaka. The service was absolutely outstanding, though the concierge had its weak point. It reminded me a little of the Ritz-Carlton Kyoto in that regard, though the St. Regis concierge was far more responsive.

The great service started with our arrival, the way they handled the taxi driver payment by cash when the machine wouldn't work. The way that almost everyone on the staff greeted us warmly, genuinely, and usually by name, even after our first arrival.

We took the elevator down to get to our first dinner and met the Executive Chef--who also knew us by name. That was a bit stunning to me. We were mightilty impressed--and looked much more forward to dining with him at La Veduta on Sunday night, as a result.

Butler service was outstanding. Our butler unpacked very well and efficiently for me despite the small closet and my large luggage:

We came back the first night to find this from our butler:

Butler service packing was also excellent--and one of the things I love most about St Regis!

We really loved her!

Anything we wanted was graciously and quickly provided. We had our 2 free garments per person pressed every day, and they shined our shoes, too.

Butler coffee wasn't as great as at other St. Regis hotels, in that they didn't have French press. They did bring us cappacinos, but they weren't always hot; we had to ask once for a second hot cappacuino. It also sometimes took longer than it should for someone to answer the phone for butler service. Overall, though, butler service was pretty great throughout our stay.

Service in the St. Regis bar, at La Veduta, and at Rue D'Or was always fantastic. Everyone knew us by name, knew we were celebrating our anniversary, and probably knew I was Ambassador status, too. We never waited long for a table, we always got a table we requested, and service was always very friendly and very helpful--and usually prompt. Service could be a bit slow at crowded breakfast, but they tried very hard.

We did have an odd moment in the St. Regis bar with my Manhattan-arita. They apparently had run out of martini glasses. They replaced mine quickly, since I wasn't in Mexico!

The concierge service was where the service really was a letdown. I was originally contacted from the butler service about my concierge requests. Though they were prompt in reply, I was never sure the requests were properly handled. That being said, they did confirm us for dinners at 2* Aragawa in and 3* Hajime in Osaka. They also worked well with us in changing our dates and swapping bookings. They even confirmed I didn't need to wear a jacket for Hajime. All that was excellent service. 

But for our planned excursions, the butler/concierge role was a bit disconcerting--and the butlers didn't inspire confidence. I finally asked to be handled specifically by the concierge. Yet that, too, went wrong--our Himeji tour guide had no private car, and the St Regis hadn't provided one as expected. I was pretty furious, but it got sorted in an hour. It took getting the Director of Rooms involved, though, to get it resolved; the head concierge seemed more concerned in showing me emails than in finding a solution to the problem. The fact that the emails later proved the hotel had dropped the ball was just added pie on her face. The hotel clearly needs to settle its concierge department so the right and left hands know what they're doing. A butler is not a concierge.

Unfortunately, the guide turned out to be totally tone deaf--perhaps the worst guide we've ever endured. After 20 minutes driving to Himejim, I told her we were canceling and to return to the hotel. I couldn't bear another 4-5 hours of her tediously explaining things over and over. She still didn't get it even as we politely and calmly explained that we didnt't think it was a good fit. The concierge looked apoplectic when we returned so quicky..,and the Director of Rooms had to be called to get the tour guide to stop following us and insisting on paying for the tour. We made the hotel deal with it after they screwed the pooch so badly on that one.

Other than the Himeji tour screw-up, however, service overall at the hotel was truly excellent. While we loved the look of the Conrad hotel, we quickly discovered the difference in service while dining there for lunch one day. It wasn't even close. The St. Regis service (and recognition) still were tops. The Ritz-Carlton service seemed very good, too, but there was a stiff formality (and Old World pretentiousness, I think) to the RC that wasn't an issue at all for us at the St Regis.

We even got a nice little token of apology for the tour mess:

As usual, dining at the St. Regis was wonderful. In fact, I won't be surprised if the La Verduta restaurant eventually received a Michelin star--it's that good.

BREAKFAST

While the breakfast buffet layout wasn't ideal--due to their current renovation of the new breakfast space--the food was still quite good,. The biggest weakness likely was the lack of more fresh fruit options.

The temporary breakfast buffet in the Rue D'Or:

Moderator's note -- I have edited out a number of photos in this section, not because they were bad or anything, but because the thread is taking way too long to load.   I have tried to picked ones that are less significant to the review but unfortunately, the editing tools for reviews are rather weak so may have gotten too many.  RichardInSF, moderator, luxury hotels and travel

ANNIVERSARY DINNDER AT LA VEDUTA

After randomly meeting the Executive Chef in the elevator on our first night, he had impressed us that he wanted to do something special for us to celebate. Boy, did he deliver!

They had set up for us a private "chef's" table right next to the kitchen:

It was hard to imagine that we could have had a better Italian dinner than we had at the La Locanda restaurant at the Ritz-Carlton Kyoto...but this was markedly better and obviously more personalized for us. This dinner easily was worthy of a Michelin star. (And we should know, having had 21 total Michlin stars in our 2 weeks in Japan alone.) Truly, an amazing and unexpected evening and a remarkable way for us to spend our final evening in Japan! Thanks again, Chef Visani!

LUNCH BEFORE DEPARTURE

We weren't sure what we'd do for lunch on our final day, since a car was picking us up at 2 pm for the Kansai airport. We looked in at La Veduta and thought it may be too dressy (we were in shorts), but our Executive Chef friend saw us and invited us in to join him for lunch. And we loved it!

Lunch normally is a buffet plus ordered items from the menu. But in our case, he told us to order whatever we wanted from the overall menu. So we did!

The buffet:

I just had to order one of the pastas that I wasn't able to get the previous night:

Wow, what a way to go. Lunch was spectacular and quite the unexpected pleasure! Thanks again, Chef!

As usual, St. Regis dining comes through with flying colors. Truly amazing dining! Major props to our Chef!

We had planned to spend one day touring around Osaka on our own. After the Himeji Castle tour fell through, we ended up walking around Osaka both of our full days in town.

We also checked our rooms/suites at the Ritz-Carlton Osaka (way too old school and formal for us), the Conrad Osaka (spectacularly dramatic and modern design with the most amazing views we can remember anywhere--including even the Aman Tokyo!), and InterContinental Osaka (nice but not nice enough, felt like a factory). 

Our highlights of a surprisingly vibrant and intriguing city:

*********More photos edited out to allow for faster loading  RichardInSF, moderator, luxury hotels and travel ***********************

We found the location to be very convenient. 

It was a 25-30 min walk for us to Osaka Castle. It was a 15 minute walk to and from Hajime. It was a 20 minute walk from the Conrad. It was a 20 min walk to the Dotonbori River. We walked a surprising lot around Osaka, partly because the weather was great and partly because it was so convenient and easy from the St. Regis!

It was about 45 min drive for us to Aragawa in Kobe, and only a 30 min drive back. Much better than expected.

It was about a 45-50 min drive for us to the Kansai KIX airport. It usually takes about 1 hour.

All in all, a great location!

We really enjoyed our stay at the St. Regis. The room could have been better updated, and the view could have been better (damn you, Conrad!), but the service and dining and air con and location were stupendous. The service and recognition really stood out here, as well as the Executive Chef's hospitality and tremendous food/beverage offerings. There are better hard products, but the St. Regis soft product is tough to beat. Even with the concierge issues.

We would stay again...but hope that the refurbishment and room renovation/refresh is completed!