Up on the 37th floor, almost 200m divorced from the honking tuk-tuks and tangled traffic of Phnom Penh, a different kind of chaos is unfolding. Cocktails are being shaken, stirred, and served at Olympic speeds to a crowd who is just as eager to devour them in record time. A murmuring, clinking soiree it is not. It’s uproariously frenzied, wet, and carefree – the kind of messy joy you remember from a time before death and taxes started occupying most of your waking thoughts. For a moment, you could almost forget where you are – take a snapshot and it might pass for Bangkok, Singapore, even Tokyo. But no, this is the capital of Cambodia, and it’s having a moment.
Sora Skybar
Held over two days in February, the Rosewood Phnom Penh’s inaugural Cocktail Festival was held at its rooftop Sora Bar to celebrate the hotel’s 7th anniversary. But the towering establishment wasn’t just marking a milestone – it was redefining what Phnom Penh can be.
Spearheaded by bar manager KT Lam, the festival featured 14 guest shifts – seven international, seven local – and brought together some of the brightest talents in the region. Among the visiting bartenders were Taki Li from Hong Kong’s Bar Leone – recently crowned No. 1 on Asia’s 50 Best Bars 2024 – Mason Park from Seoul’s Alice Cheongdam, and Kris Du from Shanghai’s Speak Low, both of which are perennial fixtures on the prestigious list.
Representing the local scene were standouts like Mawsim Distillery and Bar, whose gin became the first from Asia to be named the world’s best flavoured gin at the 2023 World Gin Awards, Samai Distillery Bar – Phnom Penh’s only rum distillery – and The Circle Phnom Penh, known for spotlighting traditional Khmer flavours in modern mixology.
It’s not (just) a stunt to land Sora on the 50 Best list. Lam, whose resume includes stints at award-winning bars like Zuma and DarkSide in Hong Kong, has his sights set on growing Phnom Penh’s cocktail culture – a tall order in a city raised on 50-cent beers and largely unconvinced of the merits of large-format ice. “They complain there’s more ice than alcohol,” he says with a laugh. “So it’s about education.”
But it’s also about fun and engagement. Since joining Rosewood Phnom Penh a year ago, Lam has helped revitalise Sora with a new cocktail menu, Alchemy of Anime, launched in January. Inspired by the bar’s Japanese DNA, the menu is presented as a hardcover book, each page featuring a signature cocktail and a manga-style hero that’s just familiar enough to elicit delight, not lawsuits.
You don’t need to be an anime fan to enjoy it. Japanese ingredients meet local flavours in a series of drinks that take your palate on a journey as playful as it is refined. Take Squad 10, for instance: A complex blend of Pierre Ferrand 1840 Cognac, sake, apricot, cold brew coffee, Ferrand Dry Curaçao, miso, lemon, orange, and milk. It’s sweet, laced with umami, and – at the risk of offending fans – far more coherent than the show it’s loosely inspired by.
Notably, each cocktail was created by a different member of the Sora team. “All I did was provide guidance and approve the drinks,” Lam says. “I’ve been in this industry for over 10 years; I don’t need the recognition.” What he does want is for Phnom Penh’s bartending community to grow. “When I entered this market, I wanted to help the community – because no one else is.”
While he admits it will take time for Phnom Penh to become a cocktail capital like Singapore (seeing as both are small cities with not much in the way of recreation outside of eating and drinking), Lam believes the Cocktail Festival, which will become an annual affair, will shift perceptions.
If Siem Reap is like the always-camera-ready aunt who everyone wants to sit next to at dinner, then Phnom Penh is like the gruff uncle who smells faintly of petrol and won’t stop talking about genocide. You don’t plan to enjoy his company – but somehow, you do.
And the Rosewood team really want more people to feel that way. The hotel offers guests curated experiences that go beyond the usual dark history checklist: From horseback rides on the city’s fringes to quiet dawn rituals at Wat Ounalom. Even a trip to Koh Dach, the nearby silk island, reveals a slower, craft-rich way of life. Within the hotel, a 112-square-metre gallery space is dedicated to showcasing Cambodia’s creative pulse.
“When this hotel opened, it brought something new to Phnom Penh,” says Managing Director Daniel Simon. “Raffles [Hotel Le Royal] and Sofitel [Phnom Penh Phokeethra] are very much ‘old luxury’, and heritage is the only story they tell. But the story we are trying to tell is that Cambodia is moving forward.”
Which is why the Rosewood Phnom Penh is housed inside the city’s first true skyscraper and offers views its resort-style competitors can’t. Occupying the top 14 floors of Vattanac Capital Tower means unobstructed panoramic views of the city. Who needs fancy wallpaper when you can watch a blood-orange jewel of a sun slowly melt into velvet dusk every evening from the comfort of your 225 sq m bed or 22m indoor pool?
(Related: Slow journeys through Southeast Asia)
Rosewood guests are the kind of travellers who crave the thrill of unfamiliar places – but appreciate the comfort of returning to something familiar at the end of the day. In addition to five-star comforts, the hotel offers a range of dining concepts, including a classic French bistro, a Japanese restaurant, a steakhouse and seafood grill, and a Chinese restaurant.
So earnest are their efforts in promoting Phnom Penh (and Cambodia as a whole) that the Rosewood has, rather unusually for this industry, teamed up with two other hospitality brands for a 12-day luxury tour around the country. The “Luxury Tour of Cambodia” includes three nights each at the Rosewood Phnom Penh, Shinta Mani Angkor, Six Senses Krabey Island, and Shinta Mani Wild. “So, you get the city, the highlands, the temples, and the ocean,” shares Simon. “You check in with us, and you’ll check out with us. If you tried to organise such a trip on your own, it would be very cumbersome.”
Phnom Penh may not have the established buzz of its neighbours, but there’s something stirring just beneath its surface – something raw, real, and ready to evolve. And from its perch in the clouds, the Rosewood isn’t just watching it happen. It’s helping make it so.
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