St. Regis Chicago

The St. Regis Chicago opened in May 2023 inside Vista Tower, the 101-story downtown skyscraper designed by Studio Gang: the tallest building in the world designed by a woman. The 192-room hotel occupies the tower's lower eleven floors at the point where the Chicago River meets Lake Michigan, marking St. Regis's first property in the American Midwest.

The place

The hotel sits at 401 East Upper Wacker Drive in Lakeshore East, a planned waterfront district built on former rail yards just east of the Loop, at the confluence of the Chicago River and Lake Michigan. The address puts guests within walking distance of the Magnificent Mile, Navy Pier, Millennium Park and Grant Park, while the tower's tapering glass form, its blue-green gradient inspired by the lake, gives most rooms a water view. Lakeshore East functions as a semi-enclosed enclave around a private central park, distinct from the denser financial core of the Loop, letting the St. Regis trade street-level bustle for direct lake and river frontage in the heart of downtown.

The concept

Vista Tower, renamed The St. Regis Chicago at its base, was developed by Magellan Development Group and designed by Studio Gang, with bKL Architecture as architect of record; at 1,198 feet and 101 stories, it is Chicago's third-tallest building and, per its developers, the tallest in the world designed by a woman. Three tapering, frustum-shaped volumes twist against one another up the skyline, a form Studio Gang has tied to structural and wind-load logic as much as to views. The hotel occupies the building's lower eleven floors, with residential condominiums rising above; interiors throughout are by Gensler and KTGY Simeone Deary Design Group, working in natural stone, wood, and metallic copper and rust tones that soften the tower's glass exterior.

The 192 keys split into 159 guest rooms and 33 suites, ranging from roughly 400 to 519 square feet, topped by a Two-Bedroom Presidential Suite with dedicated butler service. As the brand's first Midwest outpost, the hotel reads less as a resort escape than as a design-forward downtown address for a city where recent luxury openings have clustered in the Loop and Streeterville: the appeal resting as much on Studio Gang's architecture and the panoramic lake views as on the St. Regis name and its house rituals.

Dining & wellness

Dining is anchored by Miru on the 11th floor, an all-day Japanese restaurant from chef Hisanobu Osaka with two lakefront terraces designed by Rockwell Group, and by Tre Dita, a Tuscan steakhouse from chef Evan Funke that opened in autumn 2023 under Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises, its dining room designed by David Collins Studio, alongside the adjoining Bar Tre Dita for cocktails and antipasti. Wellness facilities span a dedicated floor topped by a Forbes Travel Guide Five-Star spa, an Athletic Club, a Pilates Reformer studio, and a heated indoor pool with an outdoor sundeck, while events run through the 4,721-square-foot Astor Ballroom.