Rosewood opens at AMAALA's Triple Bay
Rosewood Amaala opened on 18 August 2026, two months ahead of the October date it had been carrying, making it the hotel of the month even though it opened in the one before. It sits at Triple Bay on Saudi Arabia's northwestern Red Sea coast: 110 pool villas and 26 branded residences, ACPV Architects on the buildings, Tristan Auer on the interiors, set between the Hijazi mountains and the reef. Eight restaurants and lounges and a 2,100 square metre Asaya spa are a lot of resort to fill on a coastline with no city anywhere near it. Rosewood is the third hotel to open at Triple Bay; five more are planned, so the marina and the marine-life institute around it are still under construction. We haven't stayed, so there's nothing to compare it against yet. What we'll be watching is whether the resort's three zones, split by brief into families, couples and wellness, hold together as one hotel, and whether the rest of the destination catches up to it.
Raffles The Red Sea, due this month on Shura Island
Raffles The Red Sea is the one due in October: 121 rooms, 14 suites and 33 pool villas on Shura Island, the dolphin-shaped centrepiece of the wider Red Sea project. Accor had listed Q1 2026 for the hotel itself, while the whole destination's grand opening has been reported for this month, so the date has some give in it still. It already has a dedicated page on Raffles' official site and sits on the brand's own opening list, which is more than most years-out projects have this early. What we'll be watching: whether a brand built on colonial-era grand hotels in Singapore and Paris translates to a new island resort, or whether the villa-heavy layout ends up reading like any other Red Sea opening.
Mandarin Oriental's alpine first pushes to 2027
Mandarin Oriental Cristallo, Cortina has slipped again, from winter 2026 to 2027. It's the 1901 Art Nouveau hotel that watched over Cortina's ski era from the 1930s on, closed in 2023, and is being rebuilt by Herzog & de Meuron, the Basel firm behind Tate Modern. It was meant to land for the Milano-Cortina Winter Olympics; it missed them. The plan is 83 rooms, 30 of them suites facing the Dolomites, and it marks Mandarin Oriental's first mountain resort anywhere. We'll be watching whether the new wing respects the old bones or just sits next to them.
Park Hyatt's Mexico moves: Polanco and the Riviera Maya
Park Hyatt Mexico City opened reservations on 15 September for stays from 1 April 2027, a date pushed back again from January. It's going into Polanco, the city's upscale, walkable district already dense with competing luxury hotels. Meanwhile Park Hyatt Riviera Maya Cancun moved the other way: its opening pulled forward to 8 January 2027 from the February date carried before, and reservations are open now. It's set to be Park Hyatt's first all-inclusive, about 20 minutes south of Cancun's airport, with plunge-pool penthouses among the room types. An all-inclusive built by a brand known for restraint, in the region that invented the format, is worth watching closely once guests start writing about it.
New to the list: Dubai, Comporta and Xi'an
Three projects joined our tracking this month. Rosewood Dubai is the brand's first hotel in the city, announced for 2029 on the Peninsula Dubai waterfront: 195 rooms, eight private garden villas, and a separate tower of 63 residences and five beachfront villas next door. Park Hyatt Comporta, announced 25 August 2026, is a 58-key hotel on Portugal's Alentejo coast beside the Troia Golf Course, about an hour from Lisbon airport, built alongside 80 villas and apartments from the same developer. Mandarin Oriental, Xi'an, signed in August 2025 for 2029, puts 166 rooms, every one with a terrace, and seven pool villas next to a new park in the city's old imperial district, with ACPV Architects (Bodrum, Milan) again on the design.
Mandarin Oriental, Rome and the Oberoi in Wadi Safar
Two more are still tracking toward 2027. Mandarin Oriental, Rome spreads 108 rooms across ten restored nineteenth-century villas in the Villini Sallustiani, above the ancient Gardens of Sallust, with Gilles & Boissier on interiors and DimoreStudio handling six restaurants and bars. The Oberoi Sukoonvilas, Wadi Safar is Oberoi's first Saudi property, 60 standalone Najdi-style villas and 10 residences on a 37-acre escarpment near Diriyah's UNESCO-listed At-Turaif, with Yatra, a Rohit Ghai restaurant, among the dining list. Neither is bookable yet.
See the full, continuously updated list at /openings. Book Rosewood Amaala now if Triple Bay's mix of families, couples and wellness zones suits your week; for Raffles The Red Sea, hold off and confirm the October date directly with Accor before planning dates around it.