If you haven’t entered any dates, the rate shown is provided directly by the hotel and represents the cheapest double room (including tax) available in the next 60 days.
Prices have been converted from the hotel’s local currency (EUR700.93), via openexchangerates.org, using today’s exchange rate.
When two Baroque beauties – the former State Bank of Bavaria HQ and the Palais Neuhaus-Preysing – come together to make one elegant-as-can-be hotel, you might think an ornamentation overload would ensue. However, Rosewood Munich bows to both extremes of the city’s architecture, with a lavish façade and some restored interior flounces, married happily with a sleeker modern look. The brand’s hospitality is strong (suites and regal residences get perks aplenty), Bavarian cuisine gets a boost to the high end, and sultry, piano-soundtracked cocktails offer an alternative to beer-guzzling – it’s decorous but dialled-in, too.
Please note: don’t let our enticing gallery deceive you, some of these images for Rosewood Munich are in fact computer generated. Apologies, more real-life photographs will be with us soon…
Smith Extra
Get this when you book through us:
A seasonal fruit plate and locally made delicacy on arrival
Noon; earliest check-in, 3pm. Both are flexible on request, subject to availability and a charge.
Prices
Double rooms from £642.28 (€750), including tax at 7 per cent.
More details
Rates usually include an à la carte breakfast and a welcome gift in your room.
Also
All public areas are accessible and there’s one wheelchair-adapted room and one suite.
At the hotel
Central courtyard, lobby lounge, fitness room, charged laundry service, concierge, and free WiFi. In rooms: 55-inch smart TV, Marshall Bluetooth speaker, Nespresso machine, tea-making kit, Dyson hairdryer, and custom bath products. Suites also get a personalised welcome gift, Asaya Spa sleep kit, and a shoe-shine set. And residences get even more perks: butler service, one free transfer, a private airport pick-up and more.
Our favourite rooms
London-based interior design studio Tara Bernerd has kept the best of Rosewood Munich’s Baroque trimmings and injected some of the city’s dynamic modernism, with mid-century shapes, colourful velvets, marble panels, patterned carpets, and rugs and artwork by local creatives. But what’s most exciting is the rare opportunity to enjoy your own balcony or terrace, some with Old Town views. The König Ludwig I House (one of many residences fit for a Prinz or Prinzessin, and indeed, named after Munich’s) has one of the finest, flanked by three-metre-tall statues. And things get perk-ier in suites and residences, with a one-way transfer and welcome gift for the former; and butler service, private airport pick-up, and a bar full of welcome drinks for the latter. For intergenerational stays or groups, there are various configurations of apartment-style lodgings.
Poolside
Creamy hues and deco shapes make the spa’s heated pool (open 7am till 10pm) an elegantly serene space with sofas to sink into post-swim.
Spa
Sleek Asaya Spa has a sauna, and steam room, plus a range of treatments and wellness journeys. The fitness suite has Technogym equipment, a TRX system, classes and personal trainers for hire.
Packing tips
Munich may be steeped in history, but there’s a strong streak of Germanic hipness here, too – pack accordingly. Bring surf gear too – it’s actually possible along the Eisbach river. And perhaps sling some Berocca in your bag for any next-day beer woes.
Also
Guests get free use of the house car for short local journeys.
Pet‐friendly
Dogs can stay for €75 a stay. They’re not allowed in the restaurants, bars, spa or gym, and must be leashed and and cleaned up after. See more pet-friendly hotels in Munich.
Children
Welcome and babysitting or a nanny can be arranged at extra cost.
Sustainability efforts
Every effort has been taken to preserve the original features of the hotel’s Baroque buildings (namely, the State Bank of Bavaria headquarters and the adjacent Palais Neuhaus-Preysing). On top of that, single-use plastics have been banned, windows are double-glazed, food waste is carefully monitored, and guests are given info on the local history, culture, nature, and visitor etiquette.
Meals here are best experienced alongside the theatrics of the chef’s table, one of the hotel’s more exclusive dining experiences.
Dress Code
Leave the lederhosen and dirndls for the beer halls and swap for cocktail wear.
Hotel restaurant
Cuvilliés restaurant may be named for 18th-century Bavarian designer François de Cuvilliés, but its decor doesn’t quite follow the design cues of his favoured Rococo style (as showcased in the regal court theatre). Rather there are mustard-velvet sofas and leather button-back banquettes, stripy marbles and reeded-glass lighting – all very sleek and sophisticated. Following suit, chef Caspar Bork offers an updated, more refined take on tradition in his locally inspired dishes, such as steckerlfisch (fish grilled on a stick) or spinach dumplings.
Hotel bar
Bar Montez has been inspired by vivacious character Lola Montez, a 19th-century Irish dancer and actress who rose to fame for her Spanish dance, affairs with cultural figureheads (Liszt, Dumas…), and becoming mistress of King Ludwig I of Bavaria, who later made her a countess. So, raise an aged liquor or spirited cocktail – or indeed a bräu – to her as live music plays in this space graced by jazzy backlit stained glass and Tamara de Lempicka-style portraiture.
Last orders
Breakfast is from 6.30am to 10.30am, lunch from noon to 2.30pm and dinner from 6pm to 10pm.
Room service
Feast in your room around the clock; this is best done from the Grand Premier Suite up (where there’s dedicated dining space).
Rosewood Munich is ideally situated on Kardinal-Faulhaber-Strasse in the heart of the historic city centre.
Planes
Munich’s Franz Josef Strauss International Airport is a 40-minute drive from the hotel. The airport train station and Lufthansa shuttle bus have direct links to the city, but staff can help arrange transfers (you’ll need to provide your flight information a day in advance); a luxury sedan, Mercedes or BMW costs €205 one-way.
Trains
München Hauptbahnhof (Hbf) is the closest station, a 10-minute drive away, with direct routes to Salzburg, Innsbruck, even Paris.
Automobiles
When you’re this centrally located (and with the U-Bahn, trams, buses, and city bikes to hire), a car will just hold you back in the city’s notorious traffic jams. If necessary, the hotel’s courtesy car can take you on short journeys for free (when available), or if you’ve bought your own, valet parking is available for €50 a day (with a luggage-drop service for €10 extra), and there’s a garage close to the hotel. Electric-vehicle chargers are also available.
Worth getting out of bed for
Lean out your window (or step out onto your balcony if you have one) at 11am or noon (or 5pm from March to October) and you might just hear the 43 bells of the Rathaus Glockenspiel serenade the Old Town. If you want to also catch the show (a history-reference puppet parade in costume), then Marienplatz Square is a mere 10-minute walk away. While you’re there, see the old and new Town Halls, then take in the Gothic splendour of Frauenkirche – Munich’s cathedral – where you can climb one of its two towers to take in panoramic city views. Then be even more awed by architectural and interior conceits at Residenz Munich, the former seat of the Wittelsbach monarchs from 1508 to 1918, who never met a fresco or gilded flying buttress they didn’t like, apparently. Its Hofgarden is a splendid sight too, but it’s a speck compared to the English Garden, the ‘Central Park’ of Munich, but with a more rural feel, where you can catch a view from the Monopteros folly, ride a paddleboat and even surf the waves of the Eisbach river in the right conditions. With more than 28,000 exhibits to house, covering history, science, health, astronomy, and more, the Deutsches Museum occupies its own island in the river; and further north from there you’ll pass the majestic Maximilianeum (home to parliament) and come to the Prinzregententheater concert venue. Closer to the hotel, the Bavarian State Opera plays in the lavishly tiered National Theatre. If you’ve had your fill of antique frippery, seek out the graffiti-scrawled Museum of Urban and Contemporary Art, Brandhorst Museum’s kinetic polychromy, and the concrete bloc (sic) of the Sudetendeutsches Museum. And, you’re guaranteed a beer-y fun time at Oktoberfest.
Local restaurants
Admit it, part of you came to Munich for sausage: you’ll find it close to Marienplatz at Nürnberger Bratwurst Glöckl am Dom, where platters come with as many as 50 wurst, including those stuffed with cheese – or smaller plates for those who don’t want to go whole hog. At the other end of the dining spectrum, Prinz Myshkin is an elegant vegetarian and vegan restaurant, where no animals were harmed in the making of spinach and ricotta dumplings or tagliatelle inn truffle cream. Set in a 17th-century ducal mill, Pfistermühle sources ingredients direct from Bavarian pastures, and serves inventive plates, such as pork belly with apple gel in green gazpacho; flank steak in a barbecue jus with mango chutney and pickled shallots; and forest mushrooms in puff-pastry with a saffron risotto and onion-red-wine sauce. For beloved Bavarian dishes in a theatrical setting, head to Spatenhaus at the Opera House, or in more rustic surrounds at Zum Dürnbräu.
Local cafés
Viktualienmarkt (open Monday to Saturday, 8am to 8pm) has around 140 stalls, laden with local produce and offering wurst, bretz’n (pretzels) and obatzda (cheese dip), and yet more beer to insatiable punters. Need more Glockenspiel action? Get a prime seat for the pageantry at Café Glockenspiel opposite the Town Hall.
Local bars
Hops to it and get a round of cold ones in – Munich is to beer-drinking what Champagne is to sparkles. Do a boozy safari of the ‘big six’: Augustiner, Hacker-Pschorr, Hofbräu, Löwenbräu, Paulaner, and Spaten, all of whom meet the city’s stringent purity regulations and most of which have a keller, tavern or biergarten in the city. Otherwise, get your suds at Schneider Brauhaus, for a breakfast of weisswurst and liver dumplings from their own brewery, washed down with an Eisbock; or Richelbräu, a lively spot that hosts cultural events to elevate your drinking experience. The Golden Bar does indeed look expensive, with its gilded murals of maps, and serves elegant – but not out-of-budget – cocktails. While the Mandarin Oriental's Ory Bar is a splash-out kind of spot (well, they are a designated Krug champagne ambassador), with very inventive cocktails alongside sparkling flutes.
Every hotel featured is visited personally by members of our team, given the Smith seal of approval, and then anonymously reviewed. As soon as our reviewers have returned from this updated Baroque hotel near Marienplatz and drained their steins, a full account of their knödel-ing-about break will be with you. In the meantime, to whet your wanderlust, here's a quick peek inside Rosewood Munich…
For their first property in Germany, the Rosewood group went big and Baroque, securing the heavily embellished State Bank of Bavaria HQ and the Palais Neuhaus-Preysing to make Rosewood Munich (set to open its decorated doors come late October). Now, it has the riches of a financial institution and the grandeur of a palace, but for a wholly modern-minded guest – although the original statue-studded façade and period trimmings are welcome pleasantries from the past. Coolly dressed suites and residences largely have balconies or terraces (a rarity for the city, let alone this close to Marienplatz), and some come with perks including an on-call butler, one-way transfer or bar filled with welcome drinks. There’s spa spoiling with a side of pool lazing, a smoother-around-the-edges take on hearty Bavarian cuisine, suave cocktails as opposed to stein slamming, and the kind of slick, subtle service Rosewood excels at (including a house car to take you on free local jaunts). Whether you’re here to swoon over architecture, history hop or upgrade your weekend, it’s a wunderbar prospect.
