Opening Early 2028

Como

COMO Melbourne

Name: COMO Melbourne
Address: Melbourne, Australia

COMO's second Australian hotel, taking the lower nine floors of a new Kerry Hill-designed tower on St Kilda Road

Melbourne, Australia

First look

COMO confirmed Melbourne in October 2025, with an opening slated for early 2028. It takes the first nine levels of 'The Carter Building', a roughly $300M tower on St Kilda Road from developers Orchard Piper and Carter Group. The design is by Kerry Hill Architects, the practice behind much of COMO's recent work. On paper the plan is 102 rooms alongside 54 branded residences, with a COMO Shambhala wellness floor and a 20m indoor pool. It would be COMO's second hotel in Australia after Perth's COMO The Treasury.

A couple of details are still loose. One trade outlet referred to the project as 'COMO The Carter', so the final name isn't officially locked, and there's no dedicated property page yet. The hotel is reported as under development rather than booking. What we will be watching for is how the room count and the residences share a single tower, and whether the wellness offer matches what COMO does at its resorts. Until we can stay, this is anticipation, not a verdict.

Not yet scored. We publish a Fat Score only once a hotel is open and real guests have stayed and written about it — this is a first look, not a verdict.

Sofie, who runs the Fat Voyage booking desk with Nicolas

Want us to get you in when it opens?

Nothing to book yet — rates usually load a few months out. We're Sofie and Nicolas; tell us roughly what you're after and we'll come back the moment COMO Melbourne is bookable, with rates, what the rooms are actually like, and whether we'd go in the first season.

You'll be dealing with the two of us the whole way through, which is why we only take on a handful of trips at a time — if we're full, we'll say so. We reply by email, usually within one working day. The hotel pays us, not you: your rate is the same as booking direct, and the perks come on top.

Open now

What you can book today

COMO Melbourne is still under wraps. Here's what's already open and scored in our collection — more from Como, and nearby in Australia.

Fat Approved

Como

COMO Metropolitan London

London, United Kingdom

What you notice reading through this hotel's reviews isn't the marble or the Nobu downstairs, it's how often specific staff turn up by name. Ali the doorman comes up constantly, from a Moroccan guest who's returned for years to a family whose toddler he fussed over. Maryam gets singled out for check-in that ran faster than any hotel these travellers had used before; Vasil gets thanked for anticipating a family's needs on departure day without being asked what they were. Guests travelling with kids and those needing halal dining both describe being looked after with real thought, not box-ticking: one family mentions a birthday gift appearing in the room, another the concierge building out a full halal restaurant list and confirming the hotel's own breakfast was halal throughout. The building itself is a preference call. The apartment-style rooms are pale, marble-and-velvet modern rather than clubby or old-world, and at least one seasoned travel planner has noted it doesn't always read as distinctly London, more like a well-run international property that happens to sit at Hyde Park Corner. Fine if you want calm and understated; less so if you came for Mayfair wood panelling. One guest also reported a disputed £350 post-stay charge for carpet stains, later reduced to a £200 refund, with little clarity given along the way about how the figure was reached. It's an outlier against a large stack of glowing write-ups, but worth getting in writing before you leave. The on-site Nobu is a genuine draw on its own terms, mentioned ahead of the hotel's own breakfast room more than once, though the spa barely comes up either way. At current London rates, this earns its place if what you want is staff who remember your name by the second visit and a walk to Buckingham Palace across the park. Book it for Ali, for Nobu, and for a front desk that seems to actually retain its people; just get any incidental charges confirmed on paper before you check out.

Fat Legend

Como

Como Shambhala Estate

Ubud, Indonesia

What you're paying for at Como Shambhala is people, not the buildings. A butler shows up at the Kedara pools with a cool face cloth and chilled water before anyone's asked. Someone quietly moves a spa slot because they've noticed you want longer by the river. One guest got Bali belly and the next day found a doctor waiting, meals adjusted, plans rearranged, without having to ask twice. The wellness programming gets the same kind of praise: Ayurvedic work, nervous-system treatments, Pilates, retreats built around the guest rather than a fixed menu. The food at Glow and Kudus House keeps getting singled out too, for tasting like an actual meal rather than clean-eating penance. The catch, once you're there, is the rooms. Several recent stays landed in residences still waiting on the refurbishment running through 2027, so aesthetics vary by building more than they should, and it's worth asking which residence you'll get when you book. The medical side (blood work, deeper screening) doesn't always match what the pre-arrival consultations promise, so treat it as a bonus, not the reason to come. And Ubud proper is a short but slow, traffic-clogged drive away. If you were planning to pop into town most days, you won't be doing that easily here. None of that seems to dent how people feel leaving. Some are on their third, fourth, fifth stay, and more than one has admitted to getting emotional at checkout. People who've done both this and Amandari tend to give Shambhala the edge on staff and on the pools, even if Amandari wins on the buildings. Book it for the reset, not for a flawless building.

Fat Favorite

Como

COMO The Halkin

London, United Kingdom

Pammy Liu comes up more than anyone else in the stack of reviews on this place, and for good reason: one traveller missed a flight entirely and she rebooked the room on the spot, no fuss, no charge for the drama. Another checked in with laryngitis and the restaurant's Morris kept her stocked with tea and berries all week so she'd have a voice left by the end of the trip. A late-night laundry emergency got sorted by the night team in minutes rather than met with a shrug. The service is the reason to book this hotel, not a nice extra alongside the room, and it's held steady from last year straight through this spring. This is a 41-room Edwardian townhouse in Belgravia: no real spa, no grand lobby, nothing to linger in beyond your room and the restaurant. If a gym and pool matter to your trip, they're not here (the Corinthia, a short walk away, has both). What you do get is a quiet street near Hyde Park Corner, rooms that run genuinely spacious by London standards, and a breakfast and afternoon tea that keep getting singled out on their own merits rather than as an afterthought (the coconut waffles come up more than once, and so does Lewis walking guests through the menu at tea). Book it for a couple marking an occasion or a family with young kids: a surprise birthday cake, a themed drawing left in the room for a five-year-old, an upgrade nobody had to request. Skip it if you want a scene, a big lobby, or proper wellness facilities on site. Small and intimate cuts both ways here, and it's worth knowing which one you're booking for before you do. On the staff, though, the accounts line up: quick to solve a problem, warm about it, and never going through the motions.

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