Four Seasons Hotel at Otemachi Review, Tokyo

The 39th-floor Lounge, with its reflective water features and curved white curtains, is the setting for Japanese-hinted afternoon tea, with treats ranging from hoji tea praline mini choux and yuzu lemon glazed scones to red bean mochi. 

Nearby, it’s all about Italian-inspired cuisine in the buzzy all-day Pigneto restaurant with its walls of windows, geometric tilework, wood-fired pizza and Tuscan-style steak. Despite hovering 39 storeys above the ground, it’s also home to an unusually spacious outdoor terrace with green plants and impressive city views.

Breakfast is also served at Pigneto, with table-served choices between Continental, American or Japanese plus an à la carte menu (from miso soup and udon noodles with salmon roe to Bircher muesli and eggs royale).

The signature restaurant is est, with its atmospheric entrance, high ceilings and elegantly soft palette of peachy beige – serving up contemporary French cuisine influenced by seasonal Japanese 'terroir' by Michelin-starred chef Guillaume Bracaval. Dinner is visually striking – from soy hummus with sprinklings of kinako powder and roasted guinea fowl with hints of buckwheat to foamy tofu espuma (a Japanese take on the French cheese course) crowned by delicate flower-shaped desserts by chef patissier Michele Abbatemarco.

Just around the corner the atmosphere shifts at Virtù, an Art Deco-inspired bar, complete with a sultry after dark decor, monochrome tiled bar, glittering night views – and a menu in the form of an old fashioned hardback book containing pages of inventive French-inspired cocktails with a Japanese twist (anyone for a Champs de Lavande? A mix of vodka, lemon, violette liqueur, lavender bitters – and a splash of classic Japanese soft drink Calpis).

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