This is one of those legendary hotels where its story is as enticing as its rooms. Built in 1932, it was once at the centre of French Colonial life in Vientiane; imagine elegant evenings and grand dances. When the communist coup came in 1975 its then manager Michel Theodas and his wife Yusin fled back to France. Twenty years later Yusin and her son Billy took a pilgrimage to Laos to see the old family hotel; they found a ruin. As fate would have it Billy ran a successful Singaporean hotel management company and he couldn't resist the challenge. The Theodas clan acquired the lease and refurbished the hotel at great personal expense to bring you the opulent Vientiane bolthole it is today - by far the most luxurious hotel in the city.

After a story like that you have to stay, don't you, and enjoy the four-poster beds, the history and the glamour. French champagne anyone?