Orient Express La Dolce Vita from Accor S.A. - Italian grand tour with 12 design-led suites

Reviewed: ad hoc news Classics & Longseller desk. Edited and checked on 2026-06-29, 09:44. Details in the imprint.

Orient Express La Dolce Vita glides into the station in Rome with cream-and-gold coaches and deep-blue accents that catch the morning light. Inside, thick carpets soften every step and walnut trim frames views of cypress hills. This is Accor’s rail-born homage to Italian slow travel.

What La Dolce Vita offers

Orient Express La Dolce Vita is a luxury overnight train project under the historic Orient Express brand, co-developed by Accor and Italian partners as a new chapter of grand rail touring across Italy and beyond. The consist includes around 12 suites and several deluxe cabins, each with private bathrooms and minibar.

In the suites, guests sink into upholstered armchairs while the train rolls past terracotta rooftops and vineyards, with custom lighting casting a quiet glow that makes polished brass details look almost liquid. Painted panels nod to Italian modernism from the 1960s, giving the space a tidy yet tactile character.

Design roots and people behind it

The interior concept for Orient Express La Dolce Vita has been shaped with input from architect and designer Dimorestudio, translating mid-century Italian hospitality into compact railcar geometry. Sébastien Bazin, CEO of Accor, has described the Orient Express ventures as a way to give the brand a bold second life beyond classic hotels.

Staff on board are trained more like boutique-hotel hosts than traditional conductors, greeting guests by name and walking them through cabin controls and dining options as soon as they step on the plush corridor runner. That corridor, narrow but smooth underfoot, reinforces the feeling that the whole train is one long, quiet lobby in motion.

Cabins, bar car and routes

The train’s cabins are designed as compact hotel rooms on wheels, with beds folding into sofas during the day and a small table perched by the window for breakfast service. A dedicated bar car acts as the social heart of the train, featuring a long counter, low lighting and bar stools trimmed in leather.

Itineraries are planned as multi-night journeys connecting cities such as Rome, Venice and Palermo, plus detours through countryside and coastal stretches that traditional hotel guests rarely see at this pace. Bookings typically include full-board dining, drinks in the bar car and curated off-train excursions in selected stops.

How it feels compared with hotels

Compared with a high-end city hotel, Orient Express La Dolce Vita adds the subtle sway and muted rail noise that many guests describe as a convincing sleep aid rather than a disturbance. As the coach glides, the gentle vibration under the mattress feels closer to a distant heartbeat than to engine rumble.

Service rituals borrow from Accor’s luxury brands: turndown with small amenities, breakfast ordered by cabin number, and a tidy check-in process in the lounge car instead of at a front desk. There is less physical space than in a suite at a flagship hotel, but movement and changing scenery compensate for that constraint.

Pricing and who it targets

Pricing for Orient Express La Dolce Vita sits in the upper luxury tier of rail travel, comparable to several thousand euros per passenger for multi-day itineraries depending on cabin type and season. Trips are aimed at affluent leisure travelers, including couples celebrating anniversaries and small groups seeking curated Italian journeys.

For Accor, this product is also a way to keep the Orient Express name active in markets where the company does not yet operate a full hotel, while still tying bookings back into its broader network and loyalty program. The brand’s long history helps justify the premium, but expectations for sharp service are correspondingly high.

Where Accor shares fit in

Net-net, Orient Express La Dolce Vita is less about mass volume and more about a self-assured brand story that supports Accor’s positioning in experiential travel beyond its hotel walls. Accor shares (ISIN FR0000120404) are listed on Euronext Paris, with the Orient Express projects forming just one part of the group’s diversified hospitality portfolio.

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