Chesa Lej Alv St. Moritz
+41 81 000 11 11 Reserve
A belle époque grand hotel lit gold at blue hour, its floodlit ice rink glowing in the snow below

Blue hour on the ice at Pontresina, ten minutes up the valley

St. Moritz

A house on the
frozen lake

Forty-one rooms and suites on the south shore of Lake St. Moritz, 1 856 metres above the sea. Since 1911.

The tower of Badrutt's Palace lit gold at dusk, snow on the roofs and the peaks behind
Badrutt’s Palace at dusk, a few hundred metres along the shore from us.
A trotting horse and sulky racing across the snow of the frozen lake, spectators along the rail, in 1931
Racing on the frozen lake, St. Moritz, February 1931.

Winter here began with a wager

In September 1864, the hotelier Johannes Badrutt made four English summer guests a promise. Come back in December, he said, and if the Engadin is not sunnier than London, I will pay your journey home.

They came back, and stayed until Easter. Winter holidays as the world knows them began at a table a few hundred metres along the shore from ours.

Chesa Lej Alv opened in 1911 and is still owned by the family who built it. We keep forty-one rooms, a dining room of fourteen tables, and the same promise of light.

Altitude
1 856 m
Sunshine
322 days a year
From Zurich
3 h 20 by rail
Open
4 Dec to 5 Apr, 18 Jun to 13 Sep

Rooms & suites

Every room faces the lake or the peaks. Open one for its floor plan, or see them all with prices for your dates.

Check this suite
Polo players in red and black at full gallop through the snow on the frozen lake, the ball just ahead A grey Ferrari on packed snow in falling snow, cloud lying low across the mountains behind Two magnums of sparkling wine standing on the ice in front of a black sports car
Snow Polo World Cup, on the lake

Winter on the lake

By Christmas the lake has frozen half a metre deep. For three months it is a polo field, a driving circuit and the finest bar in the valley. Our concierge holds places for each.

  1. Snow Polo World Cup

    Four days of polo on the snow, a short walk across the ice from our terrace. Tables in the members’ tent on request.

  2. Driving on ice

    A day on a groomed ice circuit with a racing instructor beside you, learning to hold a supercar sideways. We arrange the car.

  3. Champagne on the ice

    Our bar of packed snow out on the frozen lake: magnums in ice cut from the lake itself, furs, fire pits and the last sun on Piz Julier.

Three tables, one valley

Our kitchen buys from farms between Maloja and Zernez. The char comes from Lej da Segl, the butter from Bever, the barley from the Lower Engadin.

A grand dining room in St. Moritz, crystal chandeliers over tables laid in white linen

Lej

The dining room, fourteen tables facing the lake. A five-course menu of the valley, CHF 245.

Tuesday to Saturday, from seven

Candlelit wooden tables before an open fire in a low parlour

Stüva

A parlour panelled in 1911 stone pine. Barley soup, pizokel with mountain cheese, fondue on Thursdays.

Daily, from noon

Two bottles of champagne set into the snow outside a warmly lit chalet window

Bar 322

Named for the days of sun. Champagne on ice on the snow terrace from noon, alpine gin from Pontresina, and a fire lit from four.

Daily, until one

Restaurant

The winter menu

Char with roasted onion, romanesco and nasturtium leaves on a white plate
  • Capunschard parcels, alpine butter, dried meat
  • Char from Lej da Seglbirch smoke, pickled radish
  • Bündner vealceleriac, stone pine jus
  • Engadin cheesesfrom three alpine dairies
  • Nusstortewalnut, honey, cream from Bever

Five courses, CHF 245. With wines of the Grisons, CHF 395.
Piz Bernina and Piz Roseg under deep snow, the Tschierva glacier spilling between them against a clear winter sky

Reservations

Stay with us

Forty-one rooms, one family, and a fire laid in your suite before you come in from the snow. Nothing is charged until you arrive.

  • Your arrival

    Met at Samedan airfield or the station by our Rolls-Royce Phantom, with a cashmere rug and something warm to drink.

  • Your suite

    A butler on every suite floor, a fire laid each evening, skis waxed and boots warmed by morning.

  • Your season

    Places held at the Snow Polo, The I.C.E. and White Turf, and a table at Lej the night you arrive.

See rooms and prices Speak with reservations
Chesa Lej Alv Via dal Lej 11, 7500 St. Moritz +41 81 000 11 11 reservations@lejalv.ch
Reserve