[Luxury World] '20 Million KRW per Night'... Experiencing the Shilla Hotel Suite Room Loved by Xi Jinping

Hotel Shilla Presidential Suite Room
Global VIPs Including Xi Jinping and Putin Stay
First Public Release of This Year's Package for General Public
Combined with Culture Classes Like Flower Arrangement and Whiskey

"Is this a hotel or an art museum?"

Presidential Suite living room view at Shilla Hotel Seoul.
Photo by Minji Lee

On the afternoon of the 30th, on the 22nd floor of the Shilla Hotel in Seoul, passing through a white door labeled 'Presidential Suite' and opening another door to enter the room, a large space reminiscent of a European palace comes into view. This is the reception room for welcoming guests. The furniture placed under the magnificent chandelier faithfully replicates the antique European style.

The solid wood furniture and grand piano scattered throughout the reception room bore the marks of time, making them even more elegant. The glass windows overlooking the central district of Seoul gave the impression of a large painting hanging on the wall.

View of downtown Seoul from the living room of the Presidential Suite at the Shilla Hotel Seoul.
Photo by Minji Lee

The Shilla Hotel in Seoul is unveiling its top-tier room, the Presidential Suite, to general customers. They have created a room tour package product for customers wishing to stay. The Presidential Suite is a suite room for VIP guests, where heads of state, foreign dignitaries, and internationally renowned figures have stayed. It was recently reported that West from Cannes, who visited Korea for a performance, stayed in the Presidential Suite located in Gwanghwamun, sparking increased consumer interest in this luxury room.

Typically, general customers who are not VIPs are not given the opportunity to book or stay in this room. The price for the Presidential Suite in domestic 5-star hotels ranges from the high 10 million KRW to over 20 million KRW per night. Prices increase further when demand surges.

The room introduced by Shilla Hotel as a package tour is the Presidential Suite 'North Wing.' The hotel has two Presidential Suites named 'North Wing' and 'South Wing' at both ends of the 22nd-floor corridor. The North Wing room is approximately 88 pyeong (290㎡) and was designed in 1979 inspired by the Palace of Versailles in France. It consists of a reception room, dining room, bedroom, sauna room, and a bedroom space for the secretary.

This is the dining room connected to the living room. The dining area is also equipped with a refrigerator at the back so that VIPs can bring and store the food they want.

In the bathroom, you can enjoy the Namsan view. In the North Wing rooms, you can enjoy the city view from the living room and the Namsan view from the bathroom.

To enter the North Wing room, one must pass through three doors from the entrance to the bedroom. This is said to be a consideration for the security-sensitive foreign dignitaries. Russian Presidents Gorbachev and Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping, American pop star Michael Jackson, and Microsoft founder Bill Gates have all stayed here.

The Shilla Hotel decided to open the room to the public because they believed they could showcase the hotel's history to general customers. They also saw it as a way to satisfy consumers' curiosity about what the rooms where heads of state stay look like. The most notable feature of this room is that it has preserved its original appearance since it was first created. A Shilla Hotel official explained, "When the chair fabric wears out, we travel around the world to find the same fabric. Except for changing the paintings hung in the frames, the carpet, lighting, curtains, and furniture are all original products from the beginning."

Because of this, when items disappear due to a VIP's mistake, it takes a considerable amount of time to replace them. Since these are old items, it is difficult to find the same or similar products.

The room also shows traces of VIPs from around the world. It is fully equipped with a Middle Eastern-style manual bidet, hotline phones connecting to various countries, and a wet sauna.

Head Sommelier Ham Gyu-yeon is explaining about champagne.

The Shilla Hotel also offers culture classes along with the room tours. These culture classes include wine classes, whiskey classes, and flower arrangement classes held in the room.

The first culture class was a wine class. This wine class was conducted under the theme "Experiencing Champagne through the Five Senses." Participants could taste three types of 'Perrier-Jou?t,' a premium champagne suitable for summer, and even touch the soil where the grapes were grown. They also enjoyed the experience of smelling scents through a wine aroma kit. Ham Gyu-yeon, head sommelier at Shilla Hotel, said, "Since it is a culture class, we prepared kits so that participants can experience wine with all five senses and enjoy pairing. Customers are very satisfied with the opportunity to enjoy wine in a small group setting in the dining room of the top-tier room."

The Shilla Hotel plans to refine this package and introduce a new room tour package combined with new culture classes. This package has been conducted on a small scale (8 people) every Friday and Saturday from July until the 30th of this month. A Shilla Hotel official said, "Since it was operated as a test bed until this month, after refinement, we will newly introduce tour packages combined with flower and whiskey classes within the year. Customer response has been good, so we plan to gradually increase the number of participants from small groups."