W Macau – Studio City
Marriott's W brand in Macau: 557 cinema-themed rooms by Zaha Hadid Architects at Studio City, with a 40th-floor Cantonese restaurant and a recording studio.
- Neighbourhood
- Studio City, Cotai Strip
- Opened
- September 2023
- Design
- Zaha Hadid Architects
Photo: Marriott International Press image
Why we recommend it
W Macau is the younger, louder option in Cotai, and it is honest about it. The emphasis is on bars, music and a Cantonese fine-dining restaurant rather than on quiet, and the recording studio, the first of its kind for the brand in Greater China, shows where the hotel’s interests lie. Suites make up almost a quarter of the 557 keys, which is a high proportion for a hotel of this size.
It suits travellers who come for a show or a weekend of restaurants and want a hotel with some energy of its own. The two highest public rooms, the restaurant DIVA and the bar Blind Tiger, sit side by side on the 40th floor, so an evening can be spent entirely above the Strip.
Those more interested in architecture than in nightlife should look at Morpheus, the other Melco hotel in Cotai, and at our guide to Cotai’s Zaha Hadid, Versace and Lagerfeld towers. Our report on the opening of W Macau – Studio City gives the background.
Rooms & Suites
The 557 keys divide into 430 rooms and 127 suites, ranging from 37 to 258 square metres, with views either along the Cotai Strip or over the city. Every room has a Bluetooth sound system and the brand’s in-room W Mix Bar, in keeping with a hotel that treats music and drinks as part of the furniture.
The top category is the Extreme WOW Suite, W’s equivalent of a presidential suite: two bedrooms on the 38th floor, with floor-to-ceiling windows giving a 270-degree view, a circular bed, and a dining area whose kitchenette is faced in Portuguese-style ceramic tiles.
Dining
DIVA, on the 40th floor, is the hotel’s principal restaurant: contemporary Cantonese fine dining in an Art Deco setting, with a list of tea-infused cocktails called Te Jiu served alongside the food. Next door, Blind Tiger is a destination bar looking out over the city, built around an apothecary-inspired counter.
Lower down, Hawker Hawker is the all-day restaurant, with live kitchens cooking international and local dishes. Living Room, the brand’s take on a lobby lounge, runs from coffee by day to cocktails at night and serves pastries with Chinese and Portuguese influences; A.P.D., short for A Perfect Dose, is a speakeasy attached to it, where the drinks are built around infusion and smoke.
For the wider picture, see our gastronomic guide to Macau.
Design
The hotel was designed by Zaha Hadid Architects, the practice also responsible for Morpheus, the exoskeleton hotel in Macau. Where Morpheus is a work of structure, W Macau is more a matter of surface and theme. The interiors refer to 1950s Hollywood glamour and classic cinema, and to Macau’s maritime history, expressed through rich detailing and geometric pattern.
Local references recur at smaller scale, in the Portuguese-style tiles of the top suite and the Art Deco room given to the Cantonese restaurant. Our article on Macau as an exhibition of hotel architecture places the tower among its neighbours.
Wellness & Spa
WET, the brand’s name for its pool deck, is here an indoor space with a 16-metre pool, a jacuzzi, a cool-down pool and swing beds, together with a communal steam room and sauna. The hotel also has a spa and a gym.
The W Sound Suite is a working recording studio, the first in Greater China for the brand. For meetings and events, The Academy provides 600 square metres across seven rooms that can be combined, with an open kitchen and a drinks station.
Location
The hotel is one of the towers of Studio City, Melco’s integrated resort on the Cotai Strip in Macau, and guests have the rest of the resort on the doorstep.
