- Written by: Mona Biedrzycka
The drive from the airport is short but picturesque—hills and forests curving gently upward. The car swings rhythmically through hairpin turns, winding higher through dense greenery. I’m adjusting to this motion—steady, hypnotic—until a final bend lifts us out of the trees. There it stands: the Dolder Grand, perched like a disney fantasy above Zurich. Below it, a private golf course stretches out, and further still, Zurich sprawls toward the lake, glistening like polished silver. It feels lighter up here, as if at this altitude, the world has politely agreed to hold its troubles back.
It’s hard to say exactly when The Dolder Grand gets to you. Maybe it’s when the car glides into the circular drive and you step beneath that aerodynamic red canopy—sleek, silent, absurdly smooth. One doorman nods. Another offers a hand. You don’t remember handing over your bag, but it has been taken care of. Or maybe, minutes later, when you’re standing on your balcony. The ice clinks. The Negroni catches the light. And below, the lake glimmers, the city hums, and the mountains just sit there, while the wind nudges your collar like it knows you’ve come up for air.
The High Ground: Where Zurich Glitters
Since 1899, The Dolder Grand has played host to the kind of guests who appreciate discretion, precision, quiet luxury and uninterrupted views. But it wasn’t until 2008 that the building took its current shape, when Norman Foster reimagined it with two sweeping, curved wings.
The walk to my room leads through The Kiss — the lone junction where past and future brush against each other. I step from thick carpets and chandeliers into a corridor lined with light and polished silence. The new wing opens in glass and steel, the air sharper, the tone more deliberate. Outside, the façade is etched with perforated panels laser-cut to echo the birch trees surrounding the hotel. They filter the day into pieces. Inside, shadows slide softly along the walls. The whole place seems to inhale with the forest and exhale into the view.
A few steps along the way, a pop of colour catches my eye — a Murakami flower, grinning absurdly from its polished pedestal. It shouldn’t make sense here, but it does. This isn’t a neutral passageway; it’s a space that watches you back. From structural poetry to sculptural surprises, the building begins to speak in art.
ART: A COLLECTION THAT LIVES AMONG YOU
At The Dolder Grand, art doesn’t hang behind velvet ropes. It lingers—quietly, confidently—in corners, hallways, even by the lift. You don’t stumble into galleries. You live among them.
At the entrance to The Restaurant, Salvador Dalí’s Femmes métamorphosées — all elongated limbs, ants, and lobster ballerinas mid-pirouette — anchor the approach like both a warning and an invitation—a surrealist wink at the culinary performance ahead.
Around the lobby, Anish Kapoor’s mirrored monolith pulls you in like a portal, offering not just a reflection but a distortion, shimmering with the lobby’s grandeur and a flicker of your own uncertainty.
A canvas by Sylvester Stallone leans into expressionism—its jagged strokes and moody tones more emotionally fluent than you might expect from the man best known for boxing in film. Near the bar, Mel Ramos’ 2008 pin-up — The Pause That Refreshes — bursts from a Coke logo, her pop-art cheek perfectly pitched in a place where a Diet Coke costs as much as a haircut.
Out on the spa terrace, Fernando Botero’s Woman with Fruit lounges in bronze, luxurious and unbothered. In the middle of Blooms restaurant, a monumental red sculpture by Keith Haring rises like a punctuation mark against the green—flown in by helicopter, it towers over the restaurant’s tables and garden beds, offering playful contrast to the serenity around it. Meanwhile, in the main driveway, Barry Flanagan’s Leaping Hare on Curly Bell balances whimsy and grace, greeting arriving cars with sculptural levity.
None of this feels forced. The works don’t ask to be admired. They’re just there, sharing the space with you. And somehow, that makes them harder to forget. But beyond the curves and reflections, it’s the food that speaks the loudest.
If the building is the prologue, the food is the plot.
The Restaurant is where the tone shifts. Two Michelin stars. 19 Gault et Millau points. And Heiko Nieder in the kitchen—a chef whose menus are built for curiosity. Each dish arrives like proof: precise, unexpected, and exacting. It’s food that wants your attention. Sometimes it wants your admiration.
The room is serene at first—white linen, tall windows, soft daylight. But as the meal unfolds, the mood shifts. The sun sets. The lights dim. And suddenly the table becomes the stage: a recessed circle in its centre casting each dish in a quiet spotlight.
It’s deliberate. There’s no perfect photo, no flattering angle. You either focus or you miss it. Maybe that’s the point.
After an elegant parade of snacks, the dishes arrive—vibrant, flavourful, beautifully plated. Like the hake, unexpectedly paired with goose liver, miso, and yuzu—a combination that sounds like a dare but eats like a secret handshake between Japan and Gascony. Brittany lobster arrives like a postcard from a warmer latitude, paired with white asparagus, coconut, Vadouvan curry, and a flash of dill. The flavours sprawl and snap, soft and spiced, clean and creamy. It’s plush, layered, and just spicy enough to wake up your palate.
The Norway lobster, listed as “sour spicy,” lands with a clean snap and a jolt of citrus, the kind of dish that doesn’t hang around long enough. Then there’s the stuffed morel — veal salad tucked in its cap like an architectural in-joke: restrained in form, quietly rebellious in content. It’s served with peas, chervil, and walnuts, pure sly technique.
Dessert holds the rhythm without surrendering to sweetness. Nespola (also known as medlar, if you’ve never seen one) comes with cocoa fruit juice, yuzu pepper, puffed grains, and shiso, a combination that manages to be tart, herbal, and oddly refreshing. Then strawberries with white chocolate, basil, lemon, and amazake—creamy, clean, faintly fermented—like the soft return of a childhood favourite, but tuned for adult memory.
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But Dolder doesn’t let formality linger for too long. Elsewhere, the mood relaxes, without dropping standards.
Miyu: QUIET CONFIDENCE, SHARP DETAIL
Miyu, the Dolder’s seasonal Japanese pop-up, trades theatrics for precision. The place is spacious, the light is minimal, and the tone is deliberate. What began as an eight-seat omakase now expands its rhythm, offering a menu that’s restrained in volume but rich in detail. You start with the ōtoro nigiri—cool, fatty, clean—melting before the caviar on top can speak. The chawanmushi, laced with sea urchin, caviar, and black truffle, arrives steaming and still: a spoonful of umami wrapped in silk. Then there’s the unagi dashimaki tamago, an omelette rolled with the steadiness of muscle memory topped with grilled eel—sweet, earthy, and deeply satisfying, leaving a lasting echo.
BLOOMS: A GARDEN OF HIS OWN
Blooms is the most seasonal room — and by “room,” I mean garden. You eat surrounded by herbs, trees, and whatever happens to be growing that week. No walls. No ceiling. Just the present tense of nature.
It’s helmed by Robin Briner, whose approach is gentle, green, and distinctly his own. Here, vegetables take the lead — not as substitutes, but as protagonists with full arc and attitude. The weather writes the menu, and the garden sets the tone. One week it’s zucchini and nasturtium; the next, strawberries and wild fennel.
This time, I was charmed by a simple tomato-strawberry salad with chilli and pumpkin seeds — sweet, sharp, and surprisingly deep. Roasted pumpkin with tonburi, saffron, and dill pulls in richness without weight, like autumn rewritten for summer. And cauliflower with coconut, green curry, ginger, and spring onion arrives warm and aromatic, nodding eastward without drifting into mimicry.
This is vegetable cooking without affectation. The flavours are fresh, direct, and well-paced — more about composition than contrast. Most ingredients come from the land around you, and it shows. It’s elegant but unpretentious. You don’t come to Blooms to be dazzled. You come to be reminded what flavour feels like when it’s allowed to grow.
Out here, under white sailcloth canopies and a Keith Haring sculpture standing tall, Blooms feels less like dining and more like inhabiting a gentle manifesto: one that says nature can be elegant, that restraint can be indulgent, and that luxury might just mean eating a perfect radish in the right light.
Where the Edges Soften
Saltz loosens things up. Boldly styled by Rolf Sachs, the dining room inside leans into Bauhaus-gone-Negroni—colourful, confident, playful. Outside, light wood and pale textiles spill out onto the terrace, bordered by forest and facing the sunset. It's two moods in one address.
The kitchen, helmed by Julian Mai and awarded 15 Gault Millau points in 2025, plays a smart game of balance. Not too serious, not too slack. His snacks—like the Dolder Schlemmer-Schnitte - a finely built open sandwich of beef tartare with egg yolk cream, crème fraîche and raspberry vinegar-mustard “caviar.” It’s precise, punchy, and unapologetically posh. A perfect snack for the altitude. Or there’s the Gillardeau oyster with Chester bread and raspberry vinaigrette—simple, briny, gently surprising.
On my visit, the foie gras, just slightly scorched, and grilled rhubarb managed the tension between richness and acidity with real elegance. If you’re lucky, the Vichyssoise will be on—a seasonal version with salmon roe and cress, less soupy, more spoon-hugging, and utterly satisfying.
And while the full menu runs from Bouillabaisse with crayfish to oven-roasted poussin, it’s these smaller compositions—snacks, really—that show how Saltz works: bold on the plate, unfussy in the delivery, and just playful enough to feel like a proper holiday from tasting menus.
By apero hour, as the sun sinks behind the terrace, laughter rises and the lighting dims but never dips—conversation becomes easier, shoulders drop. And in this softly lit terrace, Saltz reveals itself not as a hotel fallback, but as a clear‑eyed statement of Swiss calm and culinary warmth. More of a Whispering Angel kind than a whispering sommelier.
And did I mention an outdoor Krug Champagne Bar next to Salz? It's the perfect place for those small snacks and one too many glasses of the best bubbles as an Apero at sunset.
THE END OF A PERFECT RHYTHM
The Dolder Grand stages the present meticulously, moment by moment. Morning brings birch-filtered light and Murakami. Afternoon, silence and Nieder’s precision. By night, at the terrace with a glass of bubbles, Zurich glitters below like an audience waiting for the curtain to lift.
Leaving felt odd, like stepping out of an elegantly orchestrated scene into unscored, messy life. And yet I felt grateful. Not just for the luxury, but for the way hospitality here could feel both grand and gentle, precise without pressure, indulgent without excess.
Fifteen minutes from Zurich. And still, a world away.
Photos: Dolder Grand, or @monaway
Dolder Grand Practicalities
The Dolder Grand is located at Kurhausstrasse 65, 8032 Zürich, Switzerland — just 15 minutes from Zurich’s city centre and around 20 minutes by car from Zurich Airport (ZRH). The hotel is easily accessible by car, taxi, or via the historic Dolderbahn, a cogwheel train that departs from Römerhof and climbs through leafy hills directly to the hotel entrance.
For art lovers, guests can request an iPad Art Guide at reception — a digital companion that maps out the hotel’s impressive contemporary collection, including works by Takashi Murakami, Salvador Dalí, Anish Kapoor, Keith Haring, and Fernando Botero. But wandering works too.
Dining options include:
- The Restaurant, led by chef Heiko Nieder (2 Michelin stars, 19 Gault&Millau points)
- Miyu, the hotel’s seasonal Japanese omakase
- Saltz, a relaxed yet refined space with a terrace and Krug bar, serves also as the breakfast location
- Blooms, a seasonal garden restaurant with a plant-forward menu by Robin Briner & Heiko Nieder
- Krug Terrace, an official Krug Champagne bar with premium by-the-glass pours and light snacks with a view
- Canvas Bar & Lounge, crafted cocktails, rare spirits, and live music in a setting that blends art, comfort, and alpine views
Rooms, spa treatments, dining experiences, and seasonal menus can be booked directly at thedoldergrand.com.
Advance reservations are recommended, especially for The Restaurant and Blooms during the summer months.
