As the landmark 50th anniversary edition of the Toronto International Film Festival kicks off this week, hotels across the city have been gradually filling up with visiting movie critics, publicists and producers — not to mention A-list actors like Paul Mescal (who is here promoting Hamnet) and Kirsten Dunst (who stars in Roofman). Each fall sees this starry crowd divide themselves amongst the biggest suites on offer at the city’s various luxury hotels — and for 2025, celebrities have an exciting new option in their arsenal, thanks to this summer’s opening of the Nobu Hotel Toronto. It helps that the spot has built-in ties to Hollywood — Nobu Hospitality was founded by Robert De Niro alongside movie producer Meir Teper and Chef Nobu Matsuhisa. But the hotel also has plenty of design industry star power behind it, thanks to interiors by the hospitality experts at Studio Munge.

The firm offered an early taste of what it had in store for the project last summer, when Nobu Toronto debuted its two-level restaurant. Much like the Japanese miso marinade that adorns the company’s signature black cod dish, the ground-floor bar (which is open to walk-ins) skews dark and moody. Apart from the glowing golden bar, the space’s major move is the 8.53-metre-tall bronze chainmail chandelier hanging from the ceiling. Produced by Lasvit to mimic a kimono’s drapery, it leads eyes up the back staircase — and towards the restaurant that awaits upstairs.

Once upstairs, the mood switches from suave to serene. The 140-seat dining room, for its part, feels utterly heavenly, thanks to light woods and an ethereal porcelain installation by ceramicist Andrea Braescu that hangs from the centre of a ceiling framed by radiating beams to evoke a Japanese ginkgo tree in bloom. Orbiting this central focal point, circular banquettes and hefty columns clad in black clay tiles strike a balance between openness and intimacy, framing clear sightlines while also affording moments of calm amidst the overall buzz. (A 10-seat tasting room, tucked behind Japanese whiskey oak barrels, is especially sequestered.) 

Other spaces boast just as much visual flair: The sake bar, for its part, translates “The Great Wave off Kanagawa” into a rippling plaster ceiling, while the private dining room is tucked behind bronze-tinted glass panels. Since Nobu Toronto opened a little over a year ago, its dining room in particular has become a fixture of Instagrams from the city’s social set — acting as a visual calling card that signals a big night out. (Nobu’s Passion Fruit Baked Alaska dessert has also received its fair share of visual attention.)

All this to say, given the level of care and polish involved in the design of Nobu Toronto’s restaurant design, expectations for the hotel itself — which opened its first rooms in June, with additional suites completed over the summer — were high. Perhaps sensing this, Nobu immediately distinguishes itself as “Toronto’s highest luxury hotel,” with guestrooms located on the 41st to 45th floors of Nobu’s namesake residential tower. (The condo floors below are accessed via a separate entrance.) Thanks to this altitude, rooms offer especially lofty views of the city’s Entertainment District neighbourhood in all its energetic glory. Yet despite all the surrounding activity — Ubers zipping by in one direction, and the CN Tower’s glass elevator shuttling up and down in another — what is most impressive is, again, how calm it all feels. (Anyone looking to tune out the world also has the option of effective blackout curtains.)

Turning attention indoors, an emphasis on natural materials and neutral tones wash each space with zen-like tranquility. Framed in grooved grey marble above the fireplace, even the television blends right into the pared-back, elemental environment of the Mizu suite’s living room. A blue rug picks up on the blue tones of Lake Ontario out the window, while walls framed in white oak strike a balance between Japanese craftsmanship and Canadian chalet style.

Nowhere is this atmosphere of rest and relaxation stronger than in the bathrooms. For one thing, you’re greeted by a Japanese Toto toilet, which command something of a cult following. Then, of course, there is the bath itself. Nobu is especially famous for its deep-soaking wood tubs, and the ones here are placed to offer another great vantage of the CN Tower. (If you get the right room, at least.) For the ultimate relaxation experience, opt for a salt soak that showcases the hotel’s signature scent, a blend of yuzu and ginger.

That same spirit of serenity carries over to the hotel’s amenity spaces, too. The Sakura Lounge — which serves up à la carte breakfasts and light bites — is another white oak temple, this time modeled after a Japanese teahouse. Meanwhile, the downstairs wellness centre is notable for maintaining a connection to Toronto architectural history: The wall of glass brick that the room’s Peletons face preserves a portion of the facade of the Pilkington Glass building, which had originally occupied Nobu Toronto’s Mercer Street address.

And when a celebrity’s social batteries are drained after a TIFF red carpet premiere? The hotel’s presidential suite — the 220-square-metre Nobu Villa — awaits, complete with a dedicated cocktail bar, a 10-seat dining table, and a grand piano, not to mention an expanded soaker tub fit for two. All this to say, those eager to spot A-listers around Toronto this week may be disappointed. If we were being put up somewhere that nice, we’d never leave.