With its classic red brick facade, smartly suited doormen and Knightsbridge location, the hotel has offered the same ‘splendid’, intimate hospitality for almost half a century. Managed by Joanne Taylor-Stagg (the Levin family no longer has any connection with the hotel), its ‘professional but unstuffy, helpful’ staff go the extra mile. ‘The top-hatted doorman ran out on the street, hailed a taxi and rode it back to hold the door open for us. What service!’ Generally spacious rooms – small doubles suit a single guest – blend antiques with elegant fabrics, but one of The Capital’s trump cards is its restaurant, frequented by royals. New head chef Andrew Sawyer works alongside Nathan Outlaw to create seasonal seafood menus including chilli-cured monkfish; brill, Porthilly sauce and cabbage: ‘We could appreciate why it has a Michelin star.’ Breakfast, including ‘eggs Benedict with wonderfully dark-orange egg yolk’, won equal plaudits, as did afternoon tea’s colour-coded sandwiches: ‘green bread for cucumber, pink for smoked salmon’. For more casual dining, try sister hotel The Levin, next door (see entry). (Jill and Mike Bennett)

Late news: Nathan Outlaw will close his restaurant when his contract ends in March 2019; his successor has yet to be announcedl