The Burj Al Arab is arguably one of the most iconic hotels in the world. Often referred to as a ”7-star hotel” (which isn’t a thing), the hotel is one of the most over-the-top things in Dubai, a city known for excess. The hotel is so ”exclusive” that it’s on a manmade island with a…
Continue reading: I Stayed At The Burj Al Arab Dubai, And I’m Speechless
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I absolutely love this - you're paying for a Disneyland ticket, except the guests are the mascots. And you get your own space to hide if needed.
Room rate? 🙂
Also - you mention how people watching is interesting there - are guests sociable? (I guess there may be a language barrier)
I stayed there like 15 years ago, basically it was the same mess ! Already full of people watching in awe at anything around them.
They did indeed toss out full sized Hermes his & hers toiletries, but "La grande maison" used to do the same in Bordeaux for a lower price (maybe a reason why it shutdown ?) and room that had more style
I wasn't impressed by the service. The rooms are probably the ugliest I've ever seen.
Thank you for reinforcing my theory that any woman who lists "Dubai" as a travel bucket-list destination on their dating profile is an automatic HARD NO from me.
Glad that you were able to just laugh and enjoy their behavior. That's me more often than not in Miami. Why can't people actually enjoy the life front of them without needing the social validation?
Lucky, you have me thinking about staying for a night just for the people watching. The beyond-Vegas style décor and price-to-value ratio have been deterrents, but now??? I think I'll wait for the full review before booking.
As noted previously, the theocratic petrostates don't really create, innovate, or improve; they mostly wave their proverbial d---s in the form of bling and gaudy baubles, usually built on the backs of slave labor. This is just another datapoint that fits the curve.
Are people actually allowed into any of the pools or are they just there to be photographed?
Great review... finally someone who is saying what many of us are thinking about the place.
Word. Miami is already too much facade for me, and my name isn't Liberace either, so Dubai, and this hotel in particular, will remain a black spot on the map for me...
Hey Lucky,
Can you not share the cost of the stay or how you booked it? I’m always curious about these things and you are usually very open with costs of the room, food, ect.
If money was not an object at all, I guess I'd be curious to try it for a night or 2. But I would definitely not save up and splurge for this as a treat, now that you confirmed this is basically an influencer pit of hell 😀 ... I would be so annoyed hah. Looking forward to the full review and also curious about how much you paid for this!
Lucky should sell merchandise: "I flew on your gaudy subsidized airline, suppressed my identity, and traipsed around your casino-chic dump of a resort, and all I got was this itchy infidel t-shirt!"
I have to say, the interiors are a total ball!
I suppose this would be how Tony Montana's home would look like if he got Salvador Dali as his interior designer.
What rate did you pay and what's the best way to book (any travel agent companies with perks or discounts here?)
@ dn10 -- Sorry, just updated post to reflect cost and how I booked. Virtuoso is pretty great, as it offers a complimentary massage for two people once per stay, even for a one night stay.
@ TJ -- Sorry about that, updated post to add that. Was going to share full details in the actual trip report, but that's an important detail to include here as well.
Says a lot about the world's wealth concentration when 90% of the folks here are Chinese or Russian.
Not really. It says a lot about where Russians and Chinese like to spend their money
It looks like a cross between Disneyland and a Macau casino. I struggle to imagine what discussions with the interior decorator must have been like. "We aren't aiming for a palace motif, but rather what kleptocrats think a palace looks like."
Well, the hotel perimeter cannot compare to hookers cities like LA or Miami..I forgot drug traffickers and fentanyl boys add fun to these cities...
Yup same here, lunch today is settled definitely going to Cheesecake Factory today!
Interesting you saw more Chinese & Russian more than others. To experience a place, always considered two nights to be minimum. But to each their own.
I agree that the hotel is so over the top but I don't think it's hideous, it's just true to the Dubai vibes, i.e. very plastic and pretentious. I had the same reaction as yours when I saw the picture of the phone. LOL
I’ve stayed there a few times, yes the hotel is quite over the top but it’s still nice once you get the hang of it. You didn’t mention the butlers? To me the gold tray next to the bidet with the small bar of Hermes soap for washing your butt is always interesting and they didn’t pick you in their Rolls?
You mentioned the hotel staff and how great they were, I would be interested to know where most of the staff from the UAE or outside the country?
I stayed there in 2003 - think it was $300 a night then - the decor is exactly the same - still got the mirror over the bed !
A colleague stayed there and didn’t enjoy it as it was far too much “ in your face “.
I understand the luxury and amazing service, however it’s also tasteless, lurid and tacky.
Watch Dubai Bling on Netflix along with similar franchises and money doesn’t bring class.
True. I believe Abu Dhabi sees itself as being more cultured with museums and a performing arts centre. Dubai is all about rich bloggers, cars, shopping, whose apartment is bigger and which hotel is better than the other.
This was a great post!
I swear to dog that there were moments of Tiffany in it (viz. the incredibly funny humor!), and it was a real pleasure to read.
THANK YOU for this one!
Stayed here in 2007 and it literally looks exactly the same. The only difference is that there were more full sized Hermes bath amenities at the time. I stayed there two nights and literally checked a suitcase full of product. There were also flip flops they provided that would leave an imprint of the Burj logo in the sand when you walked. Not sure if it has changed, but at the time there were 202 rooms and just over 1000 staff. We got to know our butler quite well and he really went out of his way to take care of us. He even took us for a tour of the Royal Suite -- I likened it to taking a firehose and spraying luxury all over the property. The only thing missing was a stretch 90s limo with a "V" antenna on the back.
A lot of other hotels are over the top, but in a more modern way. This is still stuck in the late 90s/early 2000s...
Not only that, avoid women who travel there regularly with no obvious job that pays enough to afford such trips.
Staff are never from the UAE. Perhaps a couple of managers. Generally the senior staff are from western countries and the lower echelons from the non developed world. Filipinos are usually customer facing as they provide excellent service although they are all taken advantage of and paid terrible salaries. You don’t expect your average UAE resident to actually work
Who owns the most expensive NYC real estate? Chinese and Russians. Bought in cash. Over Zoom.
The most interesting review in a while! Rate isn't so bad considering the massage for 2 and the size of the room (plus free Hermes goodies). Often it's 1000+ for rooms with this size elsewhere.
The most annoying is people sometimes repeatedly asking if I like to visit Dubai. When I politely say "No," they are surprisingly asking "why?"
So people asking you for your preferences are "annoying". You sound delightful to be on a date with.
What an exercise in tastelessness. 90% Ruzzian and Chinese? I'd rather spend $1400 on a Motel 6 in Bakersfield than share real estate with any ruzzian subhumans.
Lucky: you should know that there is also an overpriced tour ($70 per person) just to visit. Must admit we took it for our son who loves architecture and we thought there would be more interesting facts about this. Rooms were indeed ugly (visited Royal Suite). We asked our guide how many people visited each day: over 1000! And the tour ends of course through a souvenir boutique where they try to sell you overpriced pictures ( between 50 and 80$) of you with different fake looking backgrounds…
Burj Al Arab is memorable experiences and I celebrated my birthday.The services was amazing and the staff make me feel as celebrity. Thank you so much
Already a great introduction Lucky of, indeed, the most hideous hotel in the World! Only the exterior, is spectacular. Went there 2x for high tea over the years and I believe that's enough for me! And now with this clientele CN/RU and bloggers ... run as fast as you can ... and spend your money elsewhere 😉
Note that Ben doesn't list this as a "REVIEW" but rather an "INSIGHT". Why?Perhaps not to offend with a 1 or 2 star rating?
I've walked past it as there's a footpath/cycleway all the way along the coast from north of that hotel to the Creek where you get ferries to the city centre.Seems a 'more money than sense 'sort of place and I can't say I'd be tempted but obviously if I won a stay for free that'd be different!
Didn’t like it, thought security was rude shouting at people, well overrated IMO.
I stayed in an Airbnb in Burj Khalifa once. It was a similar experience. An iconic place to stay, huge apartment, hideous decor, an amazing pool on I think the 60th floor and friendly service at reception. When I dared to say that the decor was too bling and over the top for my taste in my review of the property I was verbally attacked by the owner. Eventually I had to get Airbnb to block the owner as their comments became ever nastier. A once in a lifetime experience but never again!
Or because the review is coming later and he just wants to share quick thoughts? As he said in the beginning of the post...
Why on Earth would you comment that, though? There's pictures in the booking site and taste is subjective. You're in the Middle East, have some cultural sense. Americans, I swear to god ...
@Loretta Jackson
The verbal retaliation from the owner is a hostile act and confirms that owners are hiding WMD in that apartment.
So the Allied coalitions, who blocked the owners, will send in armed forces to liberate the Airbnb apartment, redo the decor, make sure the to keep it that way by leaving troops in the apartment.
It's not just Airbnb. So much for cultural sense. Still swearing to god?
I'm staying here next month, and I couldn't be more excited. It's a bucket-list experience. It seems rathen intolerant and judgmental of you to describe the rooms as "hideous, gaudy, and ugly", and I could have done without the gratuitous reference to President Trump's plane. The rooms may not be your taste, and everyone has their own, but I think these rooms are pretty cool. You can never please everyone all the time. I personally don't care for the Emirates fake wood panels surrounding the windows of their planes but it's the culture and style that they like. I don't describe their planes as hideous or ugly. My taste is more Lufthansa clean and simple but I recognize that, "When in Rome, act like a Roman". Anyway, I look forward to your full review and I can't wait to experience it for myself.
Mixed opinion. I am not sure if $1400 is expensive or not considering the size the rooms and considering the service. Just because you did not care for the décor does not mean it was not elaborate or luxurious. I am surprised about the number of free things because usually KOL influenced places tend to charge for just about everything. Have you checked how much the most luxurious hotels are in some major American cities? (Even ones part of some major luxury brands.) Just a hotel room is close to the amount of this hotel. I would not stay there because of all of the KOLs and the hoopla behind it. It seems overrated even without me looking further. If you went there for coffee/tea or a meal I were to assume you had a bit of a taste for what you were in for.
Thanks for this review Lucky, what a time capsule!
I stayed here with my family for a week, back in the year 2000. Your pictures show that LITERALLY nothing has changed about that place. The decor, the service, the color scheme, the Hermes products, the restaurants. Nothing has changed, it looks exactly the same as I remember it 23 years ago.
My dad did business at the time with Jumeriah, and as a gift they offered to fly our whole family out from California (Lufthansa, business class) to Dubai to experience the hotel for a week, all expenses paid. It was by far the most memorable trip I took as an early teenager. They picked up our party from the airport in two custom Rolls Royce Silver Seraphs (Rolls Royce's were way more exclusive back then than they are now, I remember it being a big deal) and greeted us with refrigerated moist towlettes to wash our faces and hands. What a treat. Back then, the Burj Al Arab was the last major development in Dubai, and was actually quite far away from the 'center of town' back then. I remember where the Madinat Jumeriah development now stands was just a campsite and public beach and then just desert all the way towards Abu Dhabi (no JBR, no Marina district, etc).
The only thing that looks like it might have changed is that they may have cut back on the amount of Hermes products they give out for free. I remember my mom and my aunt gleefully loading up a small suitcase with perfumes and lotions when the housekeeping staff offered them, acting like the Beverly Hillbillies when they first moved into the mansion. I also remember they would give slippers down by the pool that had the Burj al Arab logo imprinted on the bottom, so when you walked through the sand it left the logo imprint. Our floor butler gave us a tour of the Royal Suite, which was a 6,000 sq ft monstrosity that had 2 stories of floor-to ceiling windows and a grand piano.
Man the memories are flooding back! Thanks for the review!
I stayed at Lily Beach in 2021. We splurged for one of the Sunset Water Suites and it was amazing. One of the best experiences of my life. Kids absolutely loved it too. I'd go back in a second.
The most entertaining review I’ve read on here! I almost want to go for the entertainment and alternate reality.
I was really surprised to see the tone of this review, from someone who is an experienced world traveller, no less. While it ends on a note of grudging admiration, I feel it very greatly misses the mark of what is really important about the experience of staying at the Burj al Arab.
For instance, it's not important to obsess over the number of Chinese or Russian tourists gaping through the lobby. Who cares? A guest at the hotel will spend most of their time at the hotel enjoying their thoroughly-lavish suite, or the facilities, or the wonderful restaurants. I don't travel, or stay in a hotel, to people-watch.
I feel this review does a disservice to this fascinating hotel, and the staff who work incredibly hard to deliver something that might be said to be beyond a world-class product. But it also does a disservice to the readers who might get a mistaken impression of the place, and because of it deny themselves an opportunity to spend a night or two in a hotel that they'll thoroughly enjoy and never forget.
We have stayed, for instance, at the Baur au Lac in Zurich, Claridge's and The Savoy in London, The Waldorf-Astoria, The Plaza in New York, The Adlon in Berlin, and any number of other 5-Star hotels. One can only conclude that if these indeed are 5-Star hotels, then the Burj is in truth and in fact a 7-Star hotel, and yes, that it is therefore now truly "a thing". The Burj leaves most other hotels in this class so far in the dust that it is in no way fair or realistic to lump it together with the others.
As someone who has stayed at the Burj al Arab several times, who thoroughly and unabashedly enjoys it, and very much looks forward to our next visits, let me give your readers a somewhat different view of the place. The author doesn't seem to enjoy it all that much, so let me offer a take on why royalty, and celebrities, and presidents, top business executives, and the uber-wealthy DO enjoy the place, and like me, want to come back time and time again.
Yes, it's flashy. It's flamboyant. It's unique. It's dazzling. It's over-the-top. It's unrestrained. It's even at times borderline delightfully ridiculous. And that's because IT'S SUPPOSED TO BE!
This is Dubai, after all. This is a city whose DNA is to take visual and architectural risks, to push the envelope, to do things done nowhere else on earth, to achieve the seemingly impossible. Thanks to the remarkable vision of the ruler of Dubai, Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, and his family and predecessors, something has been created out of pure desert that has added a new dimension to human civilization and has set new standards for us to aspire to; it has helped redefine what is possible. People who've been to Dubai can understand what I mean; those who yet haven't can hopefully just take my word for it that the world would be poorer for it were the place to not be there and to have become what it is.
Over 200 international designers worked to create the interior and exterior visual.product. Are they stupid?
Or did they intend to deliver something vastly different and well out of the ordinary? This is Arabian culture, after all, and part of why I and others enjoy it so much is their love of the visually-dazzling and the effect it has on the viewer. One only has to visit the Presidential Palace in Abu Dhabi, or the Alhambra in Grenada, or the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, or any number of other mesmerizing Islamic works of art to understand and appreciate that culture, and to quickly learn to not judge it with exclusively Western eyes and tastes.
For instance, yes, there is gold everywhere in the hotel. Gold plated bathroom fixtures, gold leaf on the furniture, tons of gold decorating the lobby and other parts of the building. And.......?
It's part of Arab culture. Arabs love gold. And so do I. And so do most people. And so have people throughout all of recorded history. What's wrong with that? Just because you don't ever see it in, say, a Marriott, does that make it a bad thing?? I for one think it's wonderful to be surrounded by that level of opulence if one has worked hard and can afford it, and so do most people of means.
So yes, there are bold primary colors juxtaposed against each other in a way that one wouldn't find in a Four Seasons in Toronto, for instance. And thank God for that, since I'm bored to death with that minimalist, sterile, ultra-modern look that one can find in dozens of cookie-cutter hotel chains around the world. I for one can't wait till my next visit to the Burj and be dazzled by bold reds set against gold, set against bright blue (intended, for instance, to reprise the color of the ocean outside).
It was to me especially off-putting, and thoroughly missing the mark, to so relentlessly characterize the hotel's decor as "hideous". Not to mention "weird", "ugly", or "gaudy", or "absolutely ridiculous". "Tacky"? "Superficial"? Compared to what? The Plaza? The St. Francis?
I agree with the commenter who characterized the review as "intolerant" and "judgmental", and that the place was simply "not to the author's taste". Perhaps Ben was just having a grumpy day when he wrote it?
As someone who has been fortunate enough to enjoy luxury offerings around the world, I can't fathom the meaning of the comment that "it's the furthest thing from bespoke luxury". I wonder why the afore-mentioned royalty, celebrities, uber-wealthy and the others don't seem to agree with this at all. In my view, it's luxury of its own unique style and dimension, but still absolutely and thoroughly luxurious.
Yes, I too wouldn't "want my home to look like this", because, for one thing, it's not supposed to be anyone's "home". It's supposed to be a fun and flamboyant vacation spot, at which it succeeds in spades. The author may "not want to stay in a hotel like this for a week", but I and countless others can assure you that I love nothing better than to spend a week (or more!) at such a magnificent hotel.
Ben says he appreciates "great service", so I'm at a loss to understand why he went into the hotel expecting anything less. After all, that is in fact part of its reputation, and I can assure readers that it does in fact deliver, in spades. It hits all the right notes of warm, classy, gracious and friendly hospitality, without crossing over as do so many other luxury venues into ever being overfamiliar, oversolicitous, intrusive or annoying. The staff has been trained to read guests needs very well, and I feel they raise service to a fine art. I'm glad that the author at least had his epiphany moment and reality check, and attitude adjustment, when he at last granted that the staff do a job that defines truly great service.
The author also neglected to go into detail of one of the best experiences of the hotel, the amount of included benefits and "freebies" that it offers guests. It absolutely positively doesn't nickle-and-dime its guests for every little thing, like most (supposed) luxury hotels these days so infuriatingly do. Like one reviewer notes, given the size of the suites and the value of included amenities, it's not really that expensive a place at all. Try staying at your typical 5-Star and having to pay $8 for a bottle of water, and maybe the graciousness of the Burj will be better appreciated.
I do agree with the author that one shouldn't stay there if one is looking for a "typical luxury hotel experience". I, for one, have been spoiled by the Burj and a few others so badly that I'm afraid that a "typical luxury hotel experience" for me these days makes me feel rather like I'm staying at a Motel 6. I have seen Paris, and there is no way now that I'm content anymore staying on the farm.
For those who used this "insight" review to validate their preconceived prejudices against Dubai or the Burj, I'd just urge you to go and see for yourself. You'll probably have your own epiphany moment and attitude adjustment, and come to be seduced by the place like so many others. After all, that's the fundamental benefit of traveling, to broaden one's horizons and shake off preconceived notions of what an unknown place is all about. One learns in an entirely different way by seeing things with one's own eyes and experiencing a place in person, in a way that is just not possible by reading books or newspapers, or perusing well-meaning online travel sites.
Hmmm. Your visit must have seemed designed just to create social media content too