Bürgenstock Hotel & Alpine Spa – where Hepburn once lived

High above Lake Lucerne, on a plateau first built upon in 1873, the Bürgenstock Hotel & Alpine Spa carries forward a resort that has sheltered Hollywood stars, heads of state and European royalty for a century and a half — a complex of luxury hotels in the historic spa region of Lake Lucerne that dates back to the 19th century, playing host to the likes of Audrey Hepburn, Konrad Adenauer, Jimmy Carter, and Indira Gandhi. It is a hotel of two faces: a dual character Swiss escape, immersed in nature's soaring beauty, where the Heritage resonates with Belle Époque glamour while the glass architecture of the Contemporary suspends guests in the scenery. Behind that split personality sit 102 rooms and suites, a 10,000 sqm Alpine Spa, two outdoor pools and access to twelve restaurants across the wider resort. The MICHELIN Guide awards it Three Keys, its highest distinction for a stay — recognition for a property that, within living memory, stood empty and bankrupt on its own mountain.

01The house

The story begins in 1873, when the first hotel opened on the Bürgenberg ridge and the resort became a magnet for the European rich and famous including Hollywood stars during Hollywood's Golden Age. The founders Bucher and Durrer built the Palace Hotel, which opened in 1903, the Bürgenstock Funicular Railway, which opened in 1888, and the Hammetschwand Lift of 1905 — together with a dozen heritage-protected buildings that still define the ridge today.

In 1953 entrepreneur Fritz Frey took over ownership of the Bürgenstock Resort, and it was during this era that the property became a hotspot for celebrities. Decades later, the owners went bankrupt and the property was sold to UBS; after a long decline, in 2007 the Qatari state fund — also responsible for the renovation of the Savoy Hotel in London — acquired the property. An extensive nine-year renovation that was completed in 2017 brought the Bürgenstock up to modern standards, adding the glass-walled Contemporary wing alongside the restored Belle Époque Heritage building.

02Rooms and suites

The newly built Bürgenstock Hotel & Alpine Spa – The Contemporary – offers modern architecture and design across 102 rooms and suites with a unique view of Lake Lucerne. The spacious rooms and suites range from 42 to 678 square metres and are furnished with the finest materials and elegant designer furniture, every one looking out over the water far below.

Insider tip

Allow a full day for the spa, the cliff path and the Hammetschwand Lift before dinner.

Arrival is part of the experience: guests come up with the legendary Bürgenstock Railway and, via the Piazza, reach the expansive terrace, the shopping arcade, and the Alpine garden before ever reaching their room — a sequence that still carries the theatre of the resort's nineteenth-century beginnings.

03Where to eat

Spices Kitchen & Terrace is the most popular restaurant on the mountain, with its open kitchen and sweeping view of the region. Its pan-Asian menu, spanning flavours from Japan, China, India and Thailand, has earned it 16 Gault & Millau points as well as recognition in the MICHELIN Guide, and it is overseen by chef Rima Vasileios, whose kitchen trades on a lively, cosmopolitan room rather than quiet formality.

Beyond Spices, the resort's dining spreads across Oak Grill & Pool Patio for lakeside grilling, Verbena by Christian Scharrer, Parisa for Persian cuisine, and Osteria Alpina Terrazza for Italian plates with a terrace view — part of a resort-wide roster that also includes Taverne 1879, which serves traditional alpine cuisine for those who want to taste typical Swiss food such as raclette and rösti.

04The bar

The Lakeview Bar does exactly what its name promises, holding a position among the hotel's restaurants with the same uninterrupted sweep over Lake Lucerne that defines the rest of the property — a spot built for an evening drink as the light changes over the water and the Alps opposite turn from green to grey to black.

05Spa and wellbeing

With views from all over Lake Lucerne, the award-winning Bürgenstock Alpine Spa offers 10,000 square metres with five pools, saunas and a relaxation room — there is something for everyone at the Alpine Spa. Facilities extend to an Alpine Spa Beauty Lounge and Boutique, an outdoor infinity pool, indoor pool, the Hollywood outdoor pool, cold pools, a floating pool, saunas, a hammam, relaxation and silent areas, a spa garden, treatment rooms, a gym, a hair spa and private spa suites.

The Hollywood Pool is the spa's single most storied feature: a restored kidney-shaped pool dating from the 1950s heyday of the resort, now a listed structure where guests can still swim beneath the same cliffside panorama that drew film stars seventy years ago. Treatments lean on Switzerland's own La Prairie products, with Susanne Kaufmann facials also available for those seeking something different.

06The neighbourhood

Accessible by car, boat and funicular railway, the resort makes a genuine getaway, with over a hundred uniquely designed luxury suites, all with views of the lake, and free access to the spa for hotel guests. The Hammetschwand Lift, originally built in 1905, is the highest outdoor elevator in Europe and was featured in the 1964 James Bond film Goldfinger — while shooting that film starring Sean Connery, the whole crew stayed at Bürgenstock's Palace Hotel.

The resort's chapel, a short walk along the cliff path, is where Audrey Hepburn married Mel Ferrer wearing a Pierre Balmain dress in 1954. Her neighbour for a time was Sophia Loren, who lived with husband Carlo Ponti in the resort's Villa Daniel from 1957 until the end of the 1960s — proof that for two of the era's biggest stars, the Bürgenstock was not a stop but a home.

07Making the most of a stay

Beyond the spa and the cliff path, the wider resort runs to an Alpine golf course, the Diamond Domes tennis courts, a cinema, and yoga classes scheduled through the week, so a stay can be stretched well past the pools and the dining rooms. For a first visit, allow time simply to walk the paths once cut by the resort's nineteenth-century pioneers — the cliffside route the Hammetschwand Lift still serves remains the cheapest and most direct way to understand why this ridge was chosen in 1873, and why it has never quite let its famous guests go.

For a weekend. For a lifetime.