Bruno the robot makes the best iced latte in Singapore. With all respect to human baristas, it’s hard to imagine a more perfect wake-me-up after an overnight flight. Installed in the lobby lounge of the COMO Metropolitan Singapore, Bruno’s arm works the portafilter like the precision instrument it is, brewing and serving his customers a range of drinks ordered online.
Further stimulation comes from the adjoining digital wall, where floral images arranged and sequenced by video artist Thomas Hilland also balance out the caffeine with a soothing effect. And if Singapore has been the city-state of the future for a long time now, COMO seems to offer the comforts and pleasures of tomorrow in a gleaming tower on Orchard Road – a short walk from myriad attractions.
This street also something of a gilded thoroughfare for luxury shopping, and this hotel is very much a part of it, with whole floors given over to leading names in design fashion within a curated retail space called Club 21. I’ve stayed at many COMO properties, from The Halkin in London to Bhutan and Bali, but this particular site represents a kind of homecoming. Founded in Singapore in 1991, COMO now brings all its signature brands together under one roof.
Bruno, the coffee machine at COMO Metropolitan Singapore
The serene lobby lounge at COMO Metropolitan Singapore
COTE Korean Steakhouse, for example, is the only Michelin-starred barbecue restaurant in the world, with branches in New York and Miami. This first Singapore outpost showcases all the smoky mastery that made the reputation of owner-operator Simon Kim. For dinner we share the Butcher’s Feast, a multi-course menu that begins with bone consommé and proceeds through four select cuts of wagyu and prime beef with Korean sides and stews.
Elsewhere in the hotel, real pride of place goes to renowned pastry chef Cédric Grolet and his eponymous patisserie, which also serves with great finesse as a bakery and tea room. As in his London and Paris locations, the pastries and sandwiches are little works of art inspired by fruits and flowers, but just for Singapore he has also crafted a range of intricate mooncakes with colours and flavours touching on this island nation’s Chinese heritage. (Another lovely flourish is the presentation box of Grolet’s wares gifted to each guest as an in-room welcome treat.)
COMO Cuisine, meanwhile, offers the hotel’s own take on contemporary international dining. Besides the global-minded all-day menu that also makes plenty of room for local curries and noodles, there’s an Asian-cosmopolitan look and feel to the layout that really sells the design schemes of architect Paola Navone, and interior decorators Koichiro Ikebuchi and Preeti Sriratana. A few of the dishes are also drawn from the options conceived by nutrition experts from the COMO Shambhala Kitchen.
A sleek glass elevator connects Club 21 and chef Cédric Grolet’s space with modern elegance
An array of beautifully detailed patisseries by chef Cédric Grolet
The spa complex is a real stunner, sleek and high-tech without ever seeming sterile or intimidating. Frankly, I’ve always been a little nervous about hyperbaric treatment, but sliding into one of the custom-built chambers here felt like getting into bed, and just an hour brought serious relief to my sore, swollen, recently broken finger. This whole floor is arrayed to make the most of the surroundings, with a hypermodern gym and suites of rooms for yoga and pilates framed by window walls that could almost be cinema screens, filled with all the drama of the skyline. And up on the roof, the highest of highlights of the COMO Singapore experience: a Sky Bar, hot tub, and cantilevered infinity pool.
There’s something about floating over this particular cityscape, watching water seem to drop off the edge of the world, that helps the guest to feel perfectly poised between past and future. Or, in other words: fully content in the present.
Singapore's stunning cityscape
Hyperbaric oxygen therapy
