Rosewood Hotels & Resorts has announced a future hotel project in Shanghai that will open near the turn of the next decade. The Rosewood Shanghai will be part of a new mixed-use development built in the city’s Jing’An District and Suhewan area.

Ten years ago, The Ritz-Carlton Shanghai, Pudong, opened on 21 June 2010 at precisely 11.08am. It is still an Art Deco jewel, on the upper floors of the César Pelli-designed 58-floor International Financial Centre IFC in Shanghai’s Pudong business area.

The arrival road for Mandarin Oriental, Sanya, skirts around Yalong Bay next to a naval base. At the hotel’s single-height, flat-topped welcome door a posse of greeters waited (all wore loose-fit camel trousers and white overshirts). A deep maroon buggy went up and down what seemed like over the hills and far away, to Villa 13.

Urban Resort Concepts (URC) has flagged a 2022 opening for the first villa-only resort set within the mountains of Moganshan, China. The 80-key PuYun Hotel and Spa will add to URC’s global portfolio of ultra-luxury hotels and resorts, including The PuLi Hotel and Spa, Shanghai, The PuXuan Hotel and Spa, Beijing and The RuMa Hotel and Residences, Kuala Lumpur, with eight further properties under development in Dubai, Bangkok, Phuket, Kota Kinabalu, Shenzhen, Hangzhou, Xi’An and Shanghai.

IHG’s Regent Hotels & Resorts luxury hotel brand has been revealed as the upcoming new operator of the Four Seasons Hotel Pudong, Shanghai. Last week, Four Seasons confirmed it would cease to manage the property from mid-May 2020.

EXCLUSIVE: Travel industry doyen, Wendy Wu, the founder Wendy Wu Tours, this week held talks with the Prime Minister of Vietnam to lobby for visa-free entry for Australian and New Zealand travellers visiting the country.

Sanya, on Hainan Island, is China’s answer to Hawaii, and foreigners should take note – for a start, 59 nations do not need a typical China visa: get one on arrival. And the weather is extremely pleasant, year round. Girlahead stayed at two of the many really top resorts in the Sanya area.

Amanyangyun, 45 minutes’ drive from the centre of Shanghai, is unique for many reasons. Other properties are converted from traditional houses. Amanfayun, near Hangzhou, is a re-use of an entire one-street village. Its houses, now individual villas, are still surrounded by tea plantations. But Amanyangyun all began because an entrepreneurial developer, Ma Dadong, then only 26, was so appalled that villages in Fuzhou were being completely submerged by a forthcoming dam that he bought 13 of their traditional stone mansions. Each is 300-500 years old, dating back to the Ming and Qing dynasties.

SANGHA Retreat by OCTAVE Institute has introduced 21 new wellness programs to help guide guests on their personal journeys of awakening to achieve mind, body and spiritual wellness.

UrbanResorts made its name with The PuLi, in Shanghai. Its latest luxury hotel, The PuXuan Hotel and Spa, opened February 2019 at the north-east corner of Beijing’s Forbidden City. It is a fascinating concept, soaring up to the ninth floor rooftop, above Guardian Auction space – the owner of the 116-room hotel, Chen Dongsheng, is not only Beijing’s auction king but also one of China’s insurance supremos.

Scenic Luxury Cruises and Tours has launched its Oriental Wonders of China, Japan, South Korea and India 2020/2021 brochure, which features a new program in South Korea and a range of new Scenic Enrich experiences in Japan and China.

Rosewood Hotels & Resorts has opened a second property in mainland China which has also become the tallest five-star hotel in the world.