The unique design that is the Pan-Pacific Orchard tower – the columns also host fire escape stairs.
Check-in
In the densely-populated,sustainability-minded city state of Singapore,these days it’s a case of what goes down,must go up. That means,when you build a tower (which is the obvious and dominant nature of construction here) you don’t leave the life-giving vegetation at ground level but take it with you,floor by floor. It’s a philosophy that Singapore’s stewards have planted in the imaginations of its architects and planners as it strives to become one of the planet’s greenest places,something exemplified by this recently opened,horticulturally minded high-rise,the 347-room Pan Pacific Orchard hotel.
The look
Multiple terraces and cool pools bring the outside in to the Pan Pacific Orchard.
Biophilic bliss on a grand scale. The hotel – close to the Orchard Road shopping strip with its bland wall-to-wall malls – is the latest project of WOHA,the Singapore-Australian architectural firm. It’s been behind most of Singapore distinctive,tropical green hotels,beginning with its decade-old Parkroyal Collection Pickering conception,also part of the parent eco-minded Pan Pacific group. WOHA’s newest green hotel is divided into a quartet of nature-zones:Forest,Garden,Cloud and Beach,each with massive open-air,cut-out-like voids allowing in air,light,nature and the abundant tropical rain that keeps – along with an elaborate reticulation system – all the vegetation green and growing. Elsewhere,solar voltaic rooftop panels help power Pan Pacific Orchard while those massive foliage-wrapped columns exist not only for structural support but to also contain and conceal the hotel’s fire escape.
The room
A Premier Balcony King room.