#11 in Top 20 London for Business · ★★★★★
Raffles London at the OWO
Whitehall, the Old War Office turned hotel, six restaurants for client variety, Spy Bar for the after.
Whitehall, the Old War Office turned hotel, six restaurants for client variety, Spy Bar for the after.
"Whitehall, the Old War Office turned hotel, six restaurants for client variety, Spy Bar for the after."
Raffles London at the OWO opened in 2023 in the restored Old War Office on Whitehall, the building from which Winston Churchill, Lord Kitchener, and the Special Operations Executive directed British military operations across two world wars. The £1.4-billion restoration (the most-expensive London hotel project of the past decade) preserved 1,100 historic rooms and converted the building into 120 hotel suites and 85 private residences. Every suite is a converted War Office room, the Churchill Suite occupies Churchill's actual wartime office, the Haldane Suite the original War Secretary's room. The dining is led by Mauro Colagreco, the chef's signature restaurant here, which earned a Michelin star in 2025; alongside it are the all-day Saison, afternoon tea, and the Spy Bar, set underground in the original Special Operations Executive bunker, plus further bars and lounges. Raffles London is the right pick for a London business trip with policy-and-government clients, since Whitehall is the seat of government: Number 10 is two minutes' walk, the Treasury is opposite the building, the Ministry of Defence across the road. It also suits media-and-broadcast clients producing London-from-Westminster content, and cross-Atlantic policy meetings where the address and the Churchillian provenance are the asset. The honest caveat: rates are among the highest in London and the Westminster setting is quiet at night, so leisure travelers after buzz should look to Mayfair or Soho.
Churchill Suite (converted from Churchill's actual wartime office) or Haldane Suite (the War Secretary's room). Granby Suite is the entry-level option.
The Spy Bar at 7pm is the after-meeting space, the underground bunker setting does part of the conversational work. Book Mauro Colagreco for the business dinner; the chef's table is reservation-only and books out two months ahead. Afternoon tea at 4pm is the low-key option for a soft meeting.
Raffles London at the OWO sits within our broader Top 20 Hotels in London for Business list. It scored an aggregate 9.7/10 across the three editorial criteria, competitive against the field but, on business-specific factors, the angle above is what earned its rank. For the alternatives in the same London neighbourhood, see Whitehall, Westminster and adjacent. For a different city entirely, see the related lists below.
Have firm dates? Our editor's advice is to book roughly twelve weeks in advance. Expect the best-positioned suites to go early; in the busy season the lead time is months, not weeks. The plunge-pool and terrace suites, the categories that justify this ranking, tend to sell out before anything else.
A ranked shortlist, a special offer worth booking, and the overpriced stay to skip. Straight from the editors.