London has never pretended to be a cheap town. But things are getting out of hand. We now live in a metropolis where a Mayfair restaurant can charge £900 for a steak, the absurd price for a slab of Wagyu at new Japanese joint Aragawa. Set against that, £1,300 for a night’s stay at the Peninsula London, the capital’s first purpose-built five star hotel since the Bulgari in 2012, seems almost a bargain. Everything is relative.But that, of course, will only get you through the door of an entry level bedroom. In reality, once you have motored through afternoon tea, a cocktail or two, dinner with a decent bottle, and of course breakfast, your credit card would soon be straining to stay under the £2,000 mark.
So what do you get for the sort of money that would cover a reasonably lavish weekend break for two in Paris or Rome? Can it ever be “worth it” for Londoners outside the global elite that is the Peninsula’s target market?
