Four Seasons Hotel des Bergues Geneva vs Four Seasons Hotel London at Tower Bridge

This is the oldest hotel in Geneva, built in 1834 on the lake, and it mostly still acts like it: the frescoes and gilded ceilings are original, the rooms were recently redone, and the top-floor Japanese restaurant, Izumi, keeps coming up as the best meal in the city, not just the best meal in the building. The doormen and valet get named repeatedly for making the arrival feel unhurried, and housekeeping shows up fast when called, sometimes leaving a small baked treat behind for no reason anyone asked for. The spa, also on the top floor, has proper natural light, two steam rooms at different temperatures, and an in-room hammam shower that nobody else in town bothers with.

Rooms in the historic wing run small for what you're paying in Swiss francs, and a few guests flagged the showerheads as underwhelming for the price. Where it actually slips is the restaurant floor at busy hours: more than one guest describes empty tables held as "reserved" while they waited fifteen minutes for a menu, or got seated after people who arrived later. A returning bar regular also noted the kitchen swapped out a beloved profiterole recipe for a stiffer, worse version, which is a strange thing to mess with when everything else on the menu is being called excellent. The bar itself is a genuine draw on its own, with a bartender who'll remake a cocktail without being asked twice.

None of that touches the case for the room and the location, which is unmatched in Geneva: on the lake, by the bridge to the Old Town, walkable to everything. Book it for a couple of nights in a renovated room and dinner at Izumi, and go in expecting the lobby to occasionally move slower than the price suggests it should.

Edwin Cooper's 1922 Port of London Authority headquarters at Ten Trinity Square is now a Four Seasons, and the building does most of the convincing before a single staff member says hello: five-metre ceilings, an art-deco dome over the Rotunda Bar, corridors that feel like a private institution rather than a chain property. The staff praise is oddly specific: a Rotunda bartender named Trey gets thanked by name well into 2026, and a spa therapist named Afroditi just as often.

The suites are the reason to book: soaring ceilings, real space, a category Four Seasons rarely offers this generously in London. The courtyard-facing base rooms are a plainer affair, and more than one guest has flagged a mattress harder and thinner than a Four Seasons should ship. The underground spa and pool are close to a consensus pick for best in the city; almost nobody who's used it argues otherwise.

Food is the soft spot: the Rotunda afternoon tea draws complaints about slow, unpaced service, sweets that miss while the savouries land, and paid top-ups on what should be included, which is an odd thing to nickel-and-dime at these rates. The location near Tower Bridge and the City splits people cleanly, a genuine retreat for some, a 25-30 minute haul for anyone whose trip is really about the West End, and billing mix-ups at the desk surface often enough to note. None of that should scare you off the suites or the spa, which are what people actually come back for.

Book a suite, not the base room, treat the spa as the main event and the tea as optional, and this rewards travellers who want history and quiet over a Mayfair postcode.