Four Seasons Resort Chiang Mai

I recently stayed here to attend a black-tie wedding event. I must say, this beautiful hotel met my high expectation. In a region awash with luxury hotels, the Four Seasons Resort Chiang Mai stands out as one that has an actual Thai-style rice farm as well as multiple cultural craft workshops (e.g. pottery, tie-dye, paper-making) on property. They even have multiple water buffalos which our kids loved and enjoyed. So the experience here is much more culturally-immersive than anywhere else, making this an excellent choice for destination weddings. Our two-bedroom residence villa (R9) was spacious and tastefully decorated, though a bit lacking in quality-of-life modernities such as: (1) easily accessible bedside power outlets (for charging personal electronics), (2) USB-C compatible devices, and (3) blue-tooth speakers and AC controller/thermostat from the current decade. What they lacked in modern hard products, they more than made up for with top-notch human service across all departments: housekeeping, breakfast buffet, kids club, ground transportation, cultural activities within the resort, etc. I judge hotels not on the mistakes they make, but on how they handle and resolve those mistakes. In our case, we had an issue with one of our room service orders (the F&B team not doing what they said they were going to do). Upon learning of our frustration, the F&B Manager came to our villa in person to apologize and resolve it in a meaningful way that in my opinion was above and beyond the norm. Breakfast buffet was good - par for the course, solid but not spectacular. Everything was good, except for the pastries which weren’t crisp. Croissants were a bit soft all over at times. This might have been due to Thailand’s humidity rather than lack of skills on the pastry chef’s part - I’m not sure. Event catering (the wedding dinner) was excellent and more memorable though.

We came here for peace and quiet, to escape the noise of the city, and to reconnect with nature, but were greeted with an incredibly loud wedding event with the worst music selection possible. There was nowhere in the entire resort where you could escape from the clamor. For over a grand a night, definitely not worth it. If you do decide to stay here, best to call ahead and ensure that there aren’t any wedding events during your stay. Otherwise, bring hearing protection.

If you want great luxury in the middle of a green paradise, this resort is for you! My pictures won’t do justice to the calm and serenity of this place. Beautiful pools surrounded by rice terraces overlooking a lovely big pond…just stand in the warm water and watch egrets and king fishers, have great cocktails, do tie-dying, buffalo bathing or yoga if you are so inclined, have a massage, visit the shop… the staff is so lovely, the food is delicious! The room, the decor, the balcony were divine. The only possible downside was that it is far from the town and it was quite expensive to arrange a car to get there but we were so happy at the resort that we decided to stay put and rest anyway. We took a trip to the highest point of Thailand, Doi Inthanon, visited the Twin Pagodas and the National Park though. I would recommend it!

This is a wonderful resort. Nestled in the woods and surrounded by rice fields, this place looks amazing. The rooms are a very good size; food is excellent and service is top notch. The hotel is able to lay on a wide range of activities but the hotel is also a great place just to relax and unwind. The only slight drawback back is that it is some way from the centre of Chiang Mai making a visit to the town tricky and/or expensive. Highly recommended.

flooded a few days before our trip. We even sent a couple of emails to Four Seasons Resort Chiang Mai inquiring about the flood situation and logistics between the resort and the airport. The resort promptly responded to our inquiries and well explained why they believe our stay there would not be impacted at all. This is very reassuring. When we arrived there, nothing failed our expectations. While the resort Chiang is definitely not a newly established one, you can definitely observe the resort spends tons of resources on in-room renovations and resort-wide maintenance. However, this is not the key factor for my recommendation here. Rather, the staff is the key to setting this resort apart from other good ones. They are passionate, patient, polite (but not stepping over the line), and proactive. Upon noticing the kids are bigger, they promptly sent us pairs of larger slippers. Ice and the lady (whose name we did not recall) who served us the lunch on the day we arrived remembered so well our preferences and took good care of us during the breakfast the next morning. Marina who we often came across at the resort lobby gave us thumb-up recommendations for our activities, including dining and shopping, and she offered to call the restaurants we picked and double checked for us that the restaurants were open and could take non-cash payments. When one of the kids got a tiny spider bite, the hotel manager came over twice to check in on him during our stay. I had a good chat with Yufei, a lady who got relocated here from Four Seasons Guangzhou and in her I sensed the passion and pride of working at Four Seasons. Last but not least, the housekeeping ladies did a fabulous job of making our room and pavilion spotless (don’t underestimate this as not every five-star hotel can maintain this level of cleanliness right now).