Review: Michelin maestro and ‘Picasso of pastry’ make Morpheus dream a reality
French culinary wizards Alain Ducasse and Pierre Hermé bring Gallic gastronomic magic to new hotel in the City of Dreams
If Las Vegas is the old king of casinos and entertainment in the west, Macau is the young ambitious prince in the east, where you find the impossible made possible, and dreams turned into reality.
The turning point came in 2001, when Macau’s gaming industry was liberalised. This attracted overseas casino operators including Sands and Wynn to set up in the former Portuguese colony, and energised local tycoons like Stanley Ho and his families to create new concepts and projects.
The latest is Morpheus Hotel in the City of Dreams, a resort and casino in Cotai Strip owned by Melco Resorts & Entertainment, a business runs by Stanley Ho’s son Lawrence.
The world’s first free-form exoskeleton steel-structured high rise has a structural geometric grid that does away with the need for internal walls or columns that would clutter its interior. Morpheus Hotel was one of the final projects undertaken by the late Zaha Hadid, the “Queen of the curve” who is said to have liberated architectural geometry, giving it a new expressive identity. Her works include the Bridge Pavilion in Zaragoza, Spain, the Ordrupgaard Annexe in Copenhagen, Sheikh Zayed Bridge in Abu Dhabi, and Guangzhou Opera House, as well as the Jockey Club Innovation Tower in Hong Kong Polytechnic University.
The “wall-less” hotel’s interior is as stunning as its exterior. The combination of steel, metal and glass, with a series of voids carved throughout the interiors, gives it a look that embraces brightness, modernity and novelty.
The 40-storey building features 770 rooms, a mix of standard guest rooms, suites and “sky villas” – nine exclusive, two-floor duplex villas that cost about US$11,138 per night.
