JW Marriott Thriving After 11 Years -- Bangkok, Thailand

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The JW Marriott Hotel opened in Bangkok in March of 1997 just in time for the massive economic problems in Thailand, and all over Asia, that started a few months later. However, the hotel weathered the storm and is thriving today due to its great location, strong management and excellent facilities, especially its restaurants.

 

Its location at the beginning of Sukhumvit Road, right between two Skytrain stations, is especially important and it’s very convenient for either business or leisure travelers. It’s easy to get around the central business district from the hotel if you have business meetings and it’s also in the middle of the shopping, dining and entertainment corridor that stretches from Siam Square to the Emporium Shopping Center at Sukhumvit Soi 24.

 

With 441 rooms and suites the hotel has plenty of variety to offer guests, with deluxe rooms, executive level rooms and suites. Each guest room has individual temperature control, LCD TV with satellite stations, Pay-Per-View movies, an in-room safe, an alarm clock, a mini-bar, a hair dryer, and tea and coffee-making facilities. They also have three two-line telephones, call waiting, conference calling, international direct dialing, voice mail, and a plug & play ultra fast high speed Internet system with data ports.

 

There are recently renovated deluxe rooms on floors eight through 15 that have a contemporary classic style combining the use of lighting and elegant. All rooms include rich wood wall paneling features, new furnishings and Marriott’s new bedding package along with the addition of rain showers in every bathroom. Also, each deluxe room has Marriott’s new technology, the “Remote Jack Pack™” (Plug-in Panel), which enables guests to easily connect their portable electronic devices such as laptops, digital cameras, play station/Xboxes, IPOD/MP3 players via “plug and play” to a 32-inch LCD flat screen television set. The Remote Jack Pack (Plug-in Panel) also features Multi-Plug which allows any form of plug to be plugged in.

 

Executive level rooms come equipped with 42-inch LCD TV’s and are located on floors 16-24. They offer special benefits and amenities for guests. The 220-square-meter Executive Lounge on the 16th floor offers a full breakfast buffet and nightly cocktails, express check-in and check-out, a fully-equipped business center and private meeting rooms. Accommodations in these rooms are available with king-size bed or twin beds.

 

Meetings and incentive programs at the JW Marriott offer world class functions and luxury meeting and banquet space total more than 1,396 square meters. The meeting facilities include the latest in audio visual technology and wireless Internet is available at an additional charge in each of the meeting rooms. Main meeting spaces include a 685 square meter ballroom which is divisible into three sections plus a 256 square meter glass wall area with a ceiling height of 5.4 meters, seven meeting rooms and a boardroom. The ballroom can accommodate up to 600 guests for banquets and classroom style meetings for 350 guests.

 

The food and beverage facilities at the hotel are of a very high caliber and we can vouch for all of the restaurants here personally except for Man Ho, the Chinese restaurant. However, it will probably be of the same standard as the rest. Starting with the Marriott Café on the ground floor you’ll find daily buffets at breakfast, lunch and dinner as well as a la carte dishes. The buffets are quite extensive and there is a fair amount of cooking to order going on including pan-fried foie gras at dinner. We’ll always had very good food here.

 

Our favorite restaurant here is the New York Steakhouse which opens only for dinner and specializes in American and Australian beef. They were the first steak house in the country to import chilled – not frozen – American Black Angus beef. The menu is straight out of the 50s and the room has a formal, ponderous look to it with huge chairs and a traditional décor. The martinis are also huge and the wine list is very good. This is probably the best steakhouse in town and is a great place to entertain either friends or business clients as they will certainly be impressed. Make sure you make a reservation as far in advance as you can because its 80 seats are usually booked every night. Also, don’t bring the kids unless they’re over 12 years old. We learned that the hard way one night.

 

As mentioned above we haven’t eaten at the Man Ho Chinese restaurant here but it features both Cantonese and Szechwan dishes. Szechwan is a rarity in Bangkok so we’ll have to try this place sometime soon as Szechwan is our favorite form of Chinese food.

 

The Thai restaurant in the hotel is called White Elephant and it’s an elegant little room that serves very high-end Thai dishes that tend to be quite traditional. The staff is pretty knowledgeable and can usually answer questions you may have about the dishes and ingredients. There’s also a Thai music show every night that features traditional dance as well.

 

The there are two restaurants in the basement of the hotel whose origin traces back to the tsunami in 2004. The hotel had just opened their Japanese restaurant a few months before and named it Tsunami. After the tragedy, management decided that it probably wasn’t a good idea to have a restaurant named Tsunami so they split the space into two (it’s huge and there’s a sake bar between the two restaurants now) and created two restaurants – one named Tsu and one named Nami.

 

Tsu is a traditional Japanese restaurant with all of the usual menu items including sushi and sashimi. The waitresses are in traditional kimonos and the décor is modern and sleek. Since the restaurants were split in half the décor is the same in Nami but the food is different – it’s all teppanyaki in Nami and the food ranges from seafood to Australian-raised Japanese Wagyu beef. You can sit at the table and watch the chef cook in front of you so it’s a  bit of a show as well. And the sake bar that separates the two restaurants has dozens of kinds of sake from Japan.

 

If you’re going to be traveling to Bangkok this is an excellent place to stay and if you’re living here it’s a great dining location.