13 hotels
The great hotels of South Africa
13 luxury hotels in South Africa are documented in this guide, ordered by international renown. The oldest, Mount Nelson, A Belmond Hotel, opened in 1899; the most recent, The Silo Hotel, in 2017. Each page gives the history, the key figures and a direct line to the events team.
Mount Nelson, A Belmond Hotel
Painted pink in 1918 to mark the end of the First World War, the Union-Castle Line's 1899 hotel still sits in nine acres of garden below Table Mountain.
198 rooms
The Silo Hotel
Twenty-eight rooms in the elevator tower of a 1924 grain silo, above Zeitz MOCAA, with windows that bulge outward like pillows.
28 rooms
Singita Boulders Lodge
Twelve suites built around the granite boulders of the Sand River, on land the Bailes family has held since 1926.
12 rooms
Singita Lebombo Lodge
Fifteen glass-walled suites hung on a cliff above the N'wanetsi River, inside a private concession of 33,000 acres in the Kruger.
15 rooms
One&Only Cape Town
Sol Kerzner's homecoming hotel, opened in April 2009 at the V&A Waterfront with Africa's first Nobu and rooms on a private island in the marina.
131 rooms
Babylonstoren
A Cape farm granted in 1692, rebuilt around a 3.5-hectare garden in which every plant is edible or medicinal.
Ellerman House
A 1906 Edwardian mansion above Bantry Bay holding one of the largest private collections of South African art, open only to its guests.
13 rooms
Cape Grace
Built on its own quay between a yacht marina and a working harbour, with Table Mountain filling the view across the masts.
Royal Malewane
Liz Biden's 1999 safari lodge in the Thornybush, where the guiding team holds more master tracker qualifications than any other lodge in Africa.
Saxon Hotel, Villas and Spa
Nelson Mandela lived in this Sandhurst house in the early 1990s and worked here on the manuscript of Long Walk to Freedom.
La Residence
Eleven suites and five vineyard cottages on a 30-acre working farm in the Franschhoek valley, each room decorated by Liz Biden in a different colour.
The Twelve Apostles Hotel and Spa
Spa treatment rooms set in rock grottoes, with the Atlantic in front and the Twelve Apostles range rising straight behind the hotel.
70 rooms
Delaire Graff Estate
Laurence Graff's wine estate on the Helshoogte Pass hangs his South African art collection in the restaurants and the lodges.
10 rooms