The Metropole Hanoi Reopens Its 1901 Heritage Wing

Sofitel Legend Metropole Hanoi reopened its Heritage Wing on 28 March 2024 after a renovation of 21 months. The wing is the original hotel, built in 1901, and contains 103 of the property’s 339 rooms. It was the most extensive work on the building since the restorations of 1992 and 2004.

The hotel

The Metropole was opened by two French investors in the summer of 1901, a white building with green shutters facing a small square near the Opera House in Hanoi. It has operated continuously since, under several names, and is the oldest hotel in the city.

Its guest book explains its standing. Charlie Chaplin spent part of his honeymoon here in 1936. Somerset Maugham stayed while writing about his travels in Indochina. Graham Greene stayed in 1951, while working on The Quiet American. In 1972 Joan Baez sheltered in the hotel’s bunker during an air raid and recorded part of a song there. The bunker was rediscovered under the pool bar in 2011, and guests can visit it on a daily tour led by the hotel’s historian.

What changed

The renovation, by David Grace Designs International of Singapore, left the architecture alone and renewed the interiors: timber floors, panelling, shuttered windows and ceiling fans were kept or restored, and new furniture and fabrics were made in a French colonial style with Vietnamese lacquer and silk. Six pairs of connecting rooms were combined into new suites with a bedroom, a parlour and a living room. The lobby received a ceiling of antiqued mirror, and the lift was decorated with hand-painted panels and silver leaf. Technology was updated throughout.

The wing now has 54 Luxury rooms, 40 Grand Luxury rooms, six Metropole suites and the three Legendary suites named after Greene, Maugham and Chaplin. The Opera Wing, added in the 1990s behind the old building, holds the remaining 236 rooms around the garden courtyard and pool.

Restaurants

Le Beaulieu, the French restaurant, has served since 1901 and was itself renovated shortly before the wing. Spices Garden serves Vietnamese food, and the Bamboo Bar by the pool is the place for a drink in the late afternoon. La Terrasse, on the pavement, is a Hanoi version of a Paris café.

Where it fits

Hanoi’s hotel scene has changed around the Metropole. Capella Hanoi opened a few streets away in 2022, and Fairmont Hanoi in 2026. Neither has its history. For a first visit to the city, and for anyone who cares about where they are staying as much as how, the Heritage Wing remains the room to ask for.