Hotel Okura Tokyo

The Okura, next door to the US Embassy, doesn’t appear to have changed much in the last half century. The huge wooden lobby’s gold-and-beige decor evokes a bygone era’s understated hipness, while the guest rooms offer an antiquated fusion of European and Japanese styles. But the Okura is taking steps to modernise itself, beginning with two ‘Relaxation Floors’ that feature jet baths, saunas and massage services in plush new rooms, and culminating in the planned reopening of the currently closed main building in 2019.