Boarding on Beach Road

It is one of the most famous hotels in the world but when Raffles in Singapore opened for business, in 1887, it was a simple 10-room bungalow. The modest hostelry at 1 Beach Road – at that time Raffles was on the waterfront – was gradually extended and upgraded by its owners, the four Armenian Sarkies brothers, to become a grand establishment.

Social life – or, as one 1920s guest described it, “wicked gaiety” – has always been pivotal to Raffles, which over the years has seen its marble lobby transformed into a roller-skating rink for “skating dinners”, annual New Year’s Eve fancy dress balls and playwright Noel Coward stepping in as an understudy with a raucous touring theatre company.

Next Sunday, the hotel will host several more parties, to celebrate its 125th anniversary (in a move as eccentric as some of its history, staff and guests, the management has chosen the date to mark the reopening after the refurbishment in 1991 rather than the original hotel opening, which fell on December 1).
Raffles has been eulogised by the many great writers who have stayed there – Rudyard Kipling declared, “Let the traveller take note: feed at Raffles” (although he preferred the beds at L’Europe, a city rival that closed in 1932). And Somerset Maugham immortalised the hotel as “standing for all the fables of the exotic East”. But in its 125th year, the story of Raffles is perhaps best told by guests and staff who know the grande dame well.

Leslie Macpherson
Leslie Macpherson’s glamorous parents were regulars at Raffles, even living at the hotel as a newly married couple during the 50s. Her Britishborn father, Bill Bloggs, moved to Southeast Asia in the 20s as director of Gestetner SE Asia. His job involved frequent trips to Singapore both before and after the second world war.

“He would always stay at Raffles, each visit for weeks at a time,” says Macpherson, who splits her time between Sydney, Australia, and Koh Samui, Thailand, where she runs a hotel, Villa M, with her husband.