Taleon Imperial Hotel

Set in a former palace, the Taleon celebrates its Imperial roots with excessive, but tired looking opulence.

From the grand entrance on the Moika canal, guests are welcomed into a vast marble lobby complete with columns, fish tank, gold elevator and red-leather chairs, setting the “more is more” tone that continues throughout. The nineteen suites and ten rooms are individually designed with imported Italian furniture and hand-painted reproductions of classic artwork, although the grandest room, the Eliseev Suite boasts restored historical furnishings including an onyx and gold plated bathroom. Such ostentatious design details are difficult to keep in perfect condition, and most rooms have noticeably worn furniture and a strong smell of smoke.

Of their two fine dining restaurants, Taleon, on the first floor, is decked out with black marble fixtures and silk-upholstered banquet chairs and has become well known for its Sunday Brunch. The top floor restaurant Victoria, is worth a visit for the stunning views of the Kazansky Cathedral and for sampling such traditional dishes as boiled veal and milk-braised rabbit. The Cigar Lounge has the intimidating aesthetic of a traditional gentlemen’s club with dark wood, stained-glass windows and the some of best cognacs in the city. Guests can also play roulette, blackjack and poker in the hotel’s casino.

There is a compact spa on the second floor, which includes a small swimming pool, sauna, banya (a Russian steam bath) and Turkish bath and two treatment rooms. The ‘beauty parlour’ is a cupboard-sized room that looked unused on my visit.

The canal-side location and proximity to the Hermitage and Nevsky Prospekt make the Taleon Imperial a very convenient hotel, and its uniquely Russian aesthetic sets it apart from its neighboring hotels. However, the business crowd and high security presence (metal detectors in the lobby) give it a tense and generally stiff atmosphere.