Cape Grace, Cape Town, South Africa
Cape Grace 5 Stars
"Overlooking the Victoria & Alfred waterfront, this luxury hotel is refined and elegant, and brings some old-world charm to Cape Town."
Hotel Overview
Review of Cape Grace, by Angela Moore
The Cape Grace has a wonderful position, right on the harbour in Cape Town. The luxury hotel is close enough to the touristy V&A Waterfront to walk to and far enough to keep its dignity. Seals swim lazily through the harbour, upon which floats the equivalent GDP of neighbouring Namibia in the form of fancy yachts.
The facilities
As an experience, the Cape Grace is somehow much more than the sum of its parts, although the parts add up very nicely indeed. The luxury hotel's small pool is surrounded by bottle-green sun loungers and there's a bijou gem of a spa.
What really defines the Cape Grace, though, and elevates it from a pleasant stay to an unforgettable experience, is the excellent service. The staff have charm, personality and style. The people on the travel desk are so efficient they should probably be running the country. This luxury hotel is lauded for its excellent employment and recruitment policies, so important in South Africa. It won a well-deserved Conde Nast Traveller Reader Award for service in 2007.
Then there is the famous Cape Grace bar, Bascule, with its huge whiskey menu, including rare single malts bought at auction - still fashionable, and worth an evening. The restaurant, one.waterfront, is excellent even by Cape Town standards.
This luxury hotel has imagination, too. At breakfast, it offers South African fruits - mulberries and prickly pear - as well as bottles of local sparkling wine. I wonder how many Cape Town property deals have been concluded here - out by the pool, on a bright day, with the African sun on the water and a view of Table Mountain.
The rooms
All the rooms at the luxury hotel have incredibly comfortable beds and huge marble bathrooms with separate showers, stocked with local South African products. The rooms that open out onto the water are the best.
Facilities
Awards
"Best Independent Hotel" Luxury Travel 08; "Gold List" Conde Nast Traveller (UK) 07; "Gold List" Conde Nast Traveler (US) 07; "No 1 in Cape Town", Tavel + Leisure 07; "Top 100 - The Best in the World" Conde Nast Traveler 06; "World's Best Business Hotels"Who stays here?
Bill Clinton and Bill Gates have both checked in at the Cape Grace.Come for...
- Use of a fleet of BMWs, free to guests
- Family holidays – great for grandparents, decent for kids
- Superb service, including Cape Town’s best travel desk
- A good location on the V&A Waterfront, which means it’s easy to get everywhere
Not Suitable for...
- The adventurous – it’s fairly staid
- Big, wild sea views – the views here are strictly harbour
Children
The hotel is very family-friendly. There are extra beds and baby cots, and interconnecting rooms for families. The hotel restaurant offers a kidEating in
The London Ritz trained chef Bruce Robertson is earning plaudits for his classically-inspired menu at the Grace’s own 'onewaterfront' restaurant. Private library/lounge with complimentary tea, coffee, juice and pastries every morning and port or sherry every evening. Waterside Café Bascule offers everything from morning cappucinos to late-night whiskies. Room service is 24 hours a day.The Press Say
“The Cape Grace was a perfect starting point – very comfortable, well-equipped rooms and an exceptionally helpful and courteous staff.” Sunday Telegraph 07Reviews
Review of Cape Grace, by Daniel Scott
With their big windows and bright colour scheme, the public areas of Cape Grace luxury hotel are light and inviting. The lobby and library lean toward a traditional feel with classic wooden furniture and comfortable couches in soothing shades of red. The mood at this luxury hotel is one of studied and cheerful informality. You are greeted, not by a large reception counter, but rather smaller desks on either side of the open lobby area. Cape Grace's mission statement stresses both the collectivism and individuality of its staff and the service bears this out, giving guests the impression that they are not just another punter passing through.
The facilities
The individual attention to detail is particularly apparent if you book a treatment in the top floor spa, with a specially prepared package, including bath robe and slippers, delivered to your room prior to the appointment. On the other hand, use of the hot spa area - sauna, steam room, mineral bath and 'rain' and 'body' showers - comes free. Elsewhere at the Cape Grace another welcome gratis feature is the 24 hour internet access in the communications centre, just off the foyer. In the library, there are also free pastries, teas and coffees on offer in the morning and port and sherry in the evening. The luxury hotel's restaurant décor is more modern and a tad more earthy. The popular waterside Bar Bascule blends both the traditional - with its whisky collection including 450 different drams - and a sleek modernity in its design, and attracts locals as well as guests. Cape Grace luxury hotel has a small outdoor swimming pool but no gym, although you can arrange access to one nearby or to have equipment brought to your room.
The rooms
From inside Cape Grace, the views are equally captivating, particularly in rooms on the Table Mountain side of the hotel. Then, on yet another gleaming Cape Town morning, you can open your French windows to the mountain and its 'Table Cloth' covering of wispy cloud, as well as a view of a great many expensive white-hulled motor yachts in the adjacent marina. All 122 guest rooms at the Cape Grace are spacious, light and pleasantly furnished. Each has more or less excellent views over either the V & A Waterfront or the marina and toward Table Mountain and Cape Town's other defining peaks - Lion's Head and Signal Hill. Ample working technology rounds off the picture of functional but homey space. Beware though, the in-room mini-deli may turn you into a home-made fudge munching, vegetable-root crunching, jelly-bean sucking couch potato!
Review of Cape Grace Hotel, by Daniel Scott
The readers of Conde Nast Traveller know a thing or two, so when they vote a property 'Best Hotel in The World (2000)' and 'Best Hotel in Africa (2001 & 2003)', you have to take notice. Whether the Cape Grace Hotel, opened in 1996 as part of Cape Town's dazzling V & A waterfront development, continues to merit such lofty accolades is debatable. But what is not in doubt is that it is a fine 5 star hotel in a premium location in one of the world's most beguiling tourist cities.
If you want to see the best side of the Cape Grace, then go for a walk around the V & A waterfront just before sunset. Like the lazy sea lions dawdling on nearby quays, you'll then be able to look back towards the hotel and the iconic Table Mountain behind it, lit up in a warm orange glow; the building throwing out a shimmering reflection into the water in front of it. In this light, the Cape Grace looks almost like a series of central Parisian mansions joined together.
From inside the Cape Grace, the views are equally captivating, particularly in rooms on the Table Mountain side of the hotel. Then, on yet another gleaming Cape Town morning, you can open your French windows to the mountain and its 'Table Cloth' covering of wispy cloud, as well as a view of a great many expensive white-hulled motor yachts in the adjacent marina.
While the V & A waterfront is regarded by some Capetonians as a bit of a tourist honey pot, it is nonetheless a good location for the Cape Grace. There is enough at the V & A to keep visitors occupied for at least a day including the Aquarium, hundreds of stores and restaurants and plenty of boat tours leaving from nearby quaysides. Also nearby is the Nelson Mandela Gateway, from which the tour to Robben Island (where the former president was detained under apartheid) departs. Central Cape Town and Camps Bay are just a 10 minute drive away too.
The mood at the Cape Grace is one of studied and cheerful informality. You are greeted, not by a large reception counter, but rather smaller desks on either side of the open lobby area. The hotel's mission statement stresses both the collectivism and individuality of its staff and the service bears this out, giving guests the impression that they are not just another punter passing through. The individual attention to detail is particularly apparent if you book a treatment in the top floor spa, with a specially prepared package, including bath robe and slippers, delivered to your room prior to the appointment. The treatments themselves - such as the African Cape Massage incorporating essential oils distilled form the indigenous Snow Bush - are also quite individual, if on the expensive side for South Africa. On the other hand, use of the hot spa area - sauna, steam room, mineral bath and 'rain' and 'body' showers - comes free. Elsewhere at the Cape Grace another welcome gratis feature is the 24 hour internet access in the Communications Centre, just off the foyer. In the Library, there are also free pastries, teas and coffees on offer in the morning and port and sherry in the evening.
With their big windows and bright colour scheme, the Cape Grace's public areas are light and inviting. The Lobby and Library lean toward a traditional feel with classic wooden furniture and comfortable couches in soothing shades of red. The décor in onewaterfront restaurant is more modern and a tad more earthy, with a coffee and cream coloured finish and artwork by South African artists. The popular waterside Bar Bascule blends both the traditional - with its whisky collection including 450 different drams - and a sleek modernity in its design, and attracts locals as well as guests.
The Cape Grace has a small outdoor swimming pool but no gym, although if you are feeling energetic you can arrange access to one nearby or to have equipment brought to your room.
The rooms
All 122 guest rooms at the Cape Grace are spacious, light and pleasantly furnished. Each has more or less excellent views over either the V & A Waterfront or the marina and toward Table Mountain and Cape Town's other defining peaks - Lion's Head and Signal Hill. Like the lobby area, the in-room look is bright but traditional and has a few decorative hints of Africa in the occasional leopard-pattern stool cover and prints of proteas on the walls. Ample working technology rounds off the picture of functional but homey space. Beware though, the in-room mini-deli may turn you into a home-made fudge munching, vegetable-root crunching, jelly-bean sucking couch potato!