Under the guidance of Deepak Ohri, CEO of Lebua Hotels & Resorts,Alfresco 64 - A Chivas Barhas taken experiencing fine whisky at its best to a whole new level. In fact, Lebua has taken it to 64 new levels, 64 floors up in Bangkok’s Tower Club at Lebua hotel. Working with Chivas Regal Whisky, the two luxury stalwarts have collaborated to create“a unique bottling of some of our oldest and rarest whiskies that were distilled in 1985 or earlier, and individually hand-selected”, so says Chivas’ master blender Colin Scott.
“We actually started work on the blend first, about a year ago,” Ohri tells me. “Then we wanted to create a space in which people could drink it at leisure. It’s been open nine days [at time of writing] and we’ve sold twelve bottles of the Lebua blend.” Twelve may not sound like many, but when one takes into account there’s only 96 of them in existence at $7000.00 a bottle, it’s hard not to be impressed. But Ohri has a knack for impressing, with endless stories about opening champagne bars selling $2400 bottles at a time when no one was buying champagne and shifting $1000-worth of caviar on a daily basis.
But it’s not all about numbers – much as some would like to believe, money doesn’t equal luxury, or as Ohri puts it, “expensive doesn’t give you experience. We hosted an evening where we brought six three-Michelin-star chefs together to make each of their best-selling dishes, then we got fine wine you can’t even buy from Sotheby’s or Christie’s. Where in the world can you get twelve different rare vintages, together in one evening with the best chefs making food for you?” Lebua’s customers aren’t just offered the opportunity to empty their pockets (the evening cost a mere $25,000), but to invest in an experience of a lifetime – and surely that’s about as priceless as it gets.
