China’s First Jacuzzi Martini Bar

By Chris Devonshire Ellis

Ah, what price the gratuitous worship of Mammon ? To what extent does total bourgeoisie become kitsch ? To how much trouble and expense do I wish to see bikini clad, potentially naked Chinese girls cavorting in a jacuzzi in a bar, and to what extent would the world like me to inflict my impressive physique upon it in the spirit of reciprocation ?

The answer to the last question is clearly “Not” as anyone unfortunate enough to have noticed the photo of me dancing one night at Senses in Shanghai clad only in boxer shorts that got plastered all over China based websites a couple of years back will testify. But bikini clad girls cavorting amidst bubbles while I sip a Gibson amongst the cool bright lights 32 stories above the Huangpu ? Well, if asking Hemingway I suspect he’d be up for it, so I won’t disagree. Wodehouse would have Jeeves extricating Bertie Wooster from the society damage such playfulness might bring (although Wooster would wear his pyjamas), whereas Serge Gainsbourg would write an erotic French, heavy breathingly sexy film score about it and cast his 13 year old daughter half naked as the siren. Joe Studwell, meanwhile, would pontificate that this denotes capitalist corruption in a still communist society, Woody Allen would dictate Freud amongst the swirling waters while trying to chat up the 20 year old waitresses, and Evelyn Waugh would sit, sullenly in the corner with a Stengher Shifter (Pink Gin) noting how hideous all the expats were. For sure, a Jacuzzi in a bar would be a source of some debate, disagreement, and idle chatter.

Well, you have the chance to argue the point. For the second floor of the craftily titled “Vue Bar” on the 32^nd floor of the newly opened Hyatt in Shanghai has just such a thing. But more of that later. The Hyatt, sited just behind the Russian Consulate and the old Richards Hotel, across the street from Shanghai Mansions, has just opened. Billing itself, slightly too far to be credible as “Hyatt On The Bund” (it’s really “Hyatt on Suzhou Creek” it does however add a much needed air of long lost glamour to the area. The Richards Hotel, close by, and now known as the Pujiang Hotel, or even more confusingly as the New Astor, was the hotel to stay at in Shanghai from 1846 to the opening of the Peace Hotel on the Bund itself, and has now been restored. That’s the place to eat – classic Shanghai cuisine and at a fraction of the Hyatts prices – an excellent chilli fried duck, braised lettuce and broccoli with garlic, washed down with a vintage bottle of 2001 Huangjui, came to RMB198 for two. Other illustrious guests who frequented the Richards included Einstein, Chaplin and Roosevelt, so you’re in good company, and it’s two minutes walk away from the Hyatt.

But up above, it’s the Hyatts Vue Bar that takes the breath away. Possibly the only vantage point to simultaneously take in views of both the Bund and Pudongs space rocket styled skyscrapers, the décor is modern, somewhat minimalistic in a Vogue stylish lounge bar kind of way. It opened two weeks ago, and a good test of a bar is to see how they make a classic cocktail. We chose Carperinia’s, and they were as they should be, and made properly with the right ingredients. You need imported Cachaca for that, so someones been paying attention to detail and training the bar staff well. Venturing upstairs, one finds the Jacuzzi, set amongst an open air setting and just waiting for some glamour. It’ll be a hit in the summer, but at chilly December, it looked a bit lost. Watch the media have product launches there and either applaud, or groan slightly as wet bikini clad young women become the must have date in Shanghai during summer 2008.

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