I spent a night in the $18,000-a-night presidential suite at the Ritz-Carlton in Moscow that was referenced in the infamous Steele dossier. Here’s what it was like.

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ritz carlton moscowKatie Warren/Business Insider

  • The $18,000-a-night Ritz-Carlton presidential suite in Moscow has hosted high-profile guests including Barack and Michelle Obama.
  • The 2,443-square-foot suite has multiple rooms, a grand piano, a private sauna, a jetted soaking tub, a panic button, and an unbeatable view of the Kremlin.  
  • The suite garnered international attention after it was mentioned in the infamous Steele Dossier, an intelligence report that included unverified claims of an alleged night’s stay in the suite by Donald Trump in 2013.
  • On a recent trip to Russia in June, I spent a night in the opulent suite.
  • While it was probably the most luxurious experience of my life, I wasn’t impressed by the food.
  • Editorial Note: Business Insider paid full price for a standard room at the Ritz-Carlton, and the reporter received an upgrade to the presidential suite at the time of check-in.
  • Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.

The Ritz-Carlton in Moscow sits on Tverskaya Street, a stone’s throw from Red Square and the Kremlin. 

While the Ritz-Carlton brand is known for its high standard of luxury, the Moscow location’s $18,000-a-night presidential suite has been in the spotlight for its mention in the infamous Steele dossier, a private intelligence report authored by Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence officer.

The report includes unverified claims that President Donald Trump stayed in the Moscow Ritz-Carlton hotel in 2013 and watched hired prostitutes "perform a ‘golden showers’ (urination) show in front of him" with the goal of defiling the presidential suite bed where Barack and Michelle Obama had previously slept. The dossier indicated that Russian intelligence videotaped this encounter to use to blackmail Trump.

Buzzfeed News released the full report in January 2017, after Trump was elected president and before his inauguration.

The claims in the Steele Dossier are unverified and Trump has denied that such an event happened.

On a recent trip to Russia, I stayed in the ultra-luxurious, $18,000-a-night presidential suite. Here’s what it was like.

On a recent trip to Russia, I spent a night in the the most expensive suite at the Ritz-Carlton in Moscow.

Katie Warren/Business Insider

The presidential suite costs 1 million rubles, or about $15,365 per night, a reservations supervisor told me.

That doesn’t include a 20% VAT, which would bring the nightly total to more than $18,000. 

The Ritz-Carlton is in the center of Moscow, a stone’s throw from Red Square and the Kremlin.

Google Maps

Source: Google Maps

I used Russia’s most popular ride sharing app, Yandex, to get to the hotel.

Katie Warren/Business Insider

My driver inexplicably dropped me off on a side street, so I lugged my suitcase through some winding back alleys before finally arriving at the front entrance.

See the rest of the story at Business Insider

See Also:

SEE ALSO: I rode the legendary Trans-Siberian Railway on a 2,000-mile journey across 4 time zones in Russia. Here’s what it was like spending 50 hours on the longest train line in the world.

DON’T MISS: I visited a 200-year-old Russian bathhouse in Moscow, where I paid $85 to be whacked with branches and doused in ice-cold water. It was the most memorable part of my trip.

Source: Business Insider – kwarren@businessinsider.com (Katie Warren)

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