1 · POSITION
Alfred Akirov belongs in the Luxury Hospitality Library as an author of places rather than simply as a hotel owner. His strongest contribution is the conversion of difficult, historically charged urban sites and heritage buildings into hospitality-led destinations. Mamilla is the clearest expression: a developer took a stalled urban seam beside Jerusalem’s Old City and turned it into a functioning district of hotels, residences, retail, public walking space and views.
2 · THE CLAIM
The defensible claim is not that Akirov designed Mamilla, the David Citadel, Mamilla Hotel, Lutetia, Café Royal or the Conservatorium. He did not. His contribution was developer authorship: selecting sites, assembling capital and rights, retaining strong architects and designers, accepting long construction and restoration periods, and holding or operating landmark assets long enough for them to become hospitality institutions.
3 · WHY GROUP XI
The project queue places Akirov in Group XI — Authors of Places. That frame is more precise than Founders & Pioneers. Alrov is a corporation and the hotels have their own architects and operators. Akirov matters because the built place is the product of his repeated decisions about location, programme, capital and patience.
4 · 1941 — IRAQ
Alrov’s current management biography records Akirov’s birth year as 1941; Globes identifies Iraq as his birthplace. The biography is useful because it places the founder outside the conventional hotel-school route. His formal education is listed by Alrov as secondary education, and his later career was made through business, property and operating experience rather than a professional architecture or hospitality degree.
5 · BEFORE ALROV
A Globes biographical profile records that Akirov was involved during the 1970s and 1980s in businesses including Arkia, Rassco and the Laromme hotel. Those activities should be treated as background rather than as fully documented authorship claims. The important point is that hotels were not an accidental late diversification after a pure real-estate career; hospitality appeared in his business life before Alrov became an international hotel owner.
6 · 1978 — ALROV
Alrov’s official milestones date the founding of the parent company to 1978. The company’s present description remains a useful summary of its DNA: development, investment and operation of luxury projects, with emphasis on landmark buildings, site heritage, international architects and long-term management quality.
7 · 1983 — PUBLIC CAPITAL
Alrov’s milestones record the flotation of the parent company on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange in 1983 at a valuation of eight million dollars. The public-company structure matters because the later hospitality portfolio would combine founder control with capital-market reporting, valuation discipline and long-duration asset ownership.
8 · 1993 — PROPERTIES AND LODGINGS
In 1993 Alrov Properties and Lodgings was floated as the vehicle concentrating the group’s income-producing property and hotel operations. The word Lodgings is not cosmetic. It indicates that hotels were placed structurally beside property investment rather than treated as a marketing extension of residential development.
9 · THE OWNER-DEVELOPER MODEL
Akirov’s mature hospitality model joins three roles that are often separated: owner, developer and operator or operating principal. In Jerusalem Alrov developed and ran hotels directly. In Europe it acquired or converted landmark buildings and for years operated them through its own structures. By 2025–2026 the model evolved again, with Mandarin Oriental taking management of Lutetia and Conservatorium while the Akirov family remained the owner.
10 · MAMILLA BEFORE ALROV
Mamilla was not a blank development site. Safdie Architects describes the 28-acre district as a former seam between old and new Jerusalem and notes that the master plan began in 1972. By the time Alrov entered, planning, public agencies, preservation questions and earlier development structures already existed. This history limits any claim that Akirov ‘created Mamilla from nothing.’
11 · 1994 — ENTRY
Globes records that Alrov entered the Mamilla project in 1994 by acquiring fifty percent from the Ladbroke group. The move was a developer’s decision to enter a project whose difficulty was already known: heritage, public counterparties, urban planning and large capital requirements were all part of the site.
12 · 1996 — CONTROL
By 1996, Globes reported that Alrov had acquired full rights to the project. Control changed the nature of Akirov’s exposure. He was no longer a minority participant in a stalled urban venture; Alrov became the developer expected to complete the hotels, residential components, commercial promenade and infrastructure.
13 · THIRTEEN YEARS
In a 2025 Globes account, Akirov described Mamilla Avenue as the transaction or project that changed his life and recalled thirteen years of planning, construction and attention to detail before the avenue opened. The statement is founder testimony, not independent evaluation, but it explains why Mamilla belongs at the centre of this People card rather than as one asset among many.
14 · THE LONG DELAY
The project’s long delivery period was not solely a matter of design ambition. Public-company disputes, planning changes, permits and negotiations with Karta repeatedly affected timing. Globes reported both arbitration over delays and Akirov’s frustration with working opposite a government company. The finished place therefore emerged from institutional endurance as much as from concept.
15 · WHAT THE DEVELOPER DID
The developer’s contribution can be described concretely: rights were consolidated, financing was committed, programme mixes were defended, contractors and professionals were coordinated, hotel and retail uses were integrated, and the asset was carried through years when delay could have made abandonment economically rational. That is a distinct form of authorship from drawing the building.
16 · WHAT MOSHE SAFDIE DID
Moshe Safdie’s authorship remains separate. His office had been involved in Mamilla from 1972 and designed the urban framework, public realm and major buildings. Safdie’s current project record names Al-Rov among the clients and explains the architecture as a bridge between old and new Jerusalem. The Library should therefore link Akirov and Safdie without collapsing developer and architect into one person.
17 · THE STREET AS THE PRODUCT
Alrov’s own description of Mamilla foregrounds the 800-metre commercial promenade, pedestrian avenue, residences, two five-star hotels and underground parking. The district’s hospitality logic is not confined to the lobby. The street itself is the product that carries people from the new city toward Jaffa Gate, while food, retail, public art, hotels and terraces produce dwell time.
18 · HERITAGE WITHOUT MUSEUMIFICATION
The project preserves and reintegrates historic structures while adding contemporary buildings. Akirov’s role was to support a development model in which heritage remained commercially active rather than being isolated as a museum object. That choice is central to his later European hotel strategy as well: historic buildings are expected to keep working, earning and hosting.
19 · THE DAVID CITADEL
The David Citadel opened in 1998 and became the first major hotel expression of Alrov’s Jerusalem hospitality platform. Safdie Architects describes the hotel as a cornerstone of the Mamilla district, built in Jerusalem limestone and organized to frame the Old City. Alrov remains owner and operator through its hotel structures.
20 · THE VIEW AS ASSET
At the David Citadel the Old City view is not only scenery; it is part of room hierarchy, terraces, pool experience and public-space orientation. For Akirov, location selection and ownership therefore become hospitality authorship before service begins. A hotel cannot reproduce that asset elsewhere because the value is tied to a precise urban position.
21 · 2007 — THE BOULEVARD OPENS
Akirov’s own later account identifies 2007 as the opening year of Mamilla Avenue. The boulevard is the project he singled out, not one of the individual hotels. That choice is revealing: the most important unit of value in his biography is a connected place rather than a branded room inventory.
22 · MAMILLA HOTEL
Mamilla Hotel opened in 2009 within the same district. Safdie Architects records 194 rooms and identifies Alrov Luxury Hotels as client, with Piero Lissoni as interior designer. The hotel’s scale is smaller and more design-forward than the David Citadel, giving Alrov two distinct luxury expressions within walking distance rather than one replicated product.
23 · PIERO LISSONI
Piero Lissoni’s authorship must remain independent. At Mamilla he shaped the interior language; later he also led the transformation of the Conservatorium in Amsterdam and redesigned the Café Royal lobby. Akirov repeatedly commissioned Lissoni because developer authorship does not require a single visual style; it can instead consist of choosing strong designers for different buildings.
24 · TWO HOTELS, ONE DISTRICT
The David Citadel and Mamilla Hotel illustrate portfolio logic at micro scale. They occupy the same Jerusalem luxury ecosystem but are not duplicates. One is larger, palatial and view-driven; the other is more intimate and design-led. The shared value comes from location and district infrastructure rather than forced brand standardization.
25 · THE MAMILLA TEST
Mamilla is the clearest admission test for Akirov. If Alrov had only bought stabilized hotels in major capitals, his People record could be reduced to capital allocation. Mamilla required urban creation, long-term development risk and a judgement about how hotels, retail and residence could repair and activate a difficult piece of city. That is why he qualifies as an author of place.
26 · 2006 — LUXURY HOTEL STRATEGY
Alrov’s milestones state that in 2006 the group decided to create a portfolio of luxury hotels in Europe and Israel. The choice transformed the Jerusalem experience into an acquisition thesis: buy or create landmark five-star properties in strong cities, preserve individuality and use architecture, heritage and location as the value proposition.
27 · LANDMARK BUILDINGS
Alrov’s current hotel strategy explicitly prefers landmark buildings in prime locations. This is not a neutral acquisition filter. It means the real-estate history of the structure becomes part of the hotel product, and capital expenditure is justified partly by the impossibility of reproducing the address elsewhere.
28 · THE EUROPEAN MOVE
The group’s official milestones place overseas operations from 2001 and the dedicated luxury-hotel portfolio decision in 2006. Europe gave Akirov a different challenge from Mamilla: instead of constructing a new mixed-use district beside an ancient city, the group had to acquire existing cultural buildings and convert or restore them without erasing identity.
29 · CAFÉ ROYAL — THE LONDON ADDRESS
Café Royal gave Alrov one of London’s most historically loaded hospitality addresses. The current hotel history traces the institution to 1865 and records its 2012 rebirth as Hotel Café Royal. The value lay not in importing a new luxury name to Regent Street, but in reviving a name already embedded in London social history.
30 · THE CROWN ESTATE STRUCTURE
Alrov financial statements describe the Café Royal property as part of a Crown Estate freehold complex and record a 125-year lease after redevelopment. The tenure structure is a reminder that luxury-hotel ownership is often legally more complex than the phrase ‘owns the hotel’ suggests. Akirov’s authorship operates through contractual control, redevelopment capital and operating structures.
31 · DAVID CHIPPERFIELD
The current Hotel Café Royal credits Sir David Chipperfield with the hotel conversion. That authorship is separate from Akirov’s. The developer chose to invest in a building whose historical rooms had to coexist with new guest accommodation and modern systems; the architect solved the spatial problem.
32 · THE HISTORIC ROOMS
Café Royal’s surviving public rooms — including the Oscar Wilde Lounge — create a hospitality asset that cannot be manufactured by branding. Akirov’s model in London depended on letting inherited history remain visible enough to anchor the new hotel. Heritage here is not themed décor; it is the physical residue of the institution itself.
33 · THE CONSERVATORIUM
In Amsterdam, the group transformed a former savings bank and later music conservatory into a luxury hotel in the Museum Quarter. Piero Lissoni’s practice dates the project 2006–2012, while the current Mandarin Oriental account places the hotel’s opening in 2011. The difference in project and operating dates is normal in a complex conversion and should not be flattened into a single construction year.
34 · A GLASS COURTYARD
The Conservatorium’s glass-covered courtyard is the architectural move that makes the reuse legible. Historic masonry remains visible while a contemporary social interior is inserted between old wings. The resulting lobby functions as a gathering room as much as circulation — a useful example of how Akirov’s asset strategy relied on new public space inside old shells.
35 · LUTETIA — THE LEFT BANK
Alrov acquired Hôtel Lutetia as an operating hotel in July 2010. The building had been created for the owners of Le Bon Marché and opened in 1910. Akirov’s acquisition added a Parisian heritage hotel whose value came from Left Bank cultural identity rather than from a chain brand.
36 · CLOSE TO REBUILD
The Lutetia closed in 2014 for a deep restoration and reopened in July 2018. JLL’s valuation records approximately €190 million of investment in the refurbishment. This is one of the clearest examples of Akirov’s willingness to accept years without normal hotel revenue in order to reposition a landmark asset.
37 · JEAN-MICHEL WILMOTTE
Jean-Michel Wilmotte led the restoration that reopened Lutetia in 2018. As with Safdie, Lissoni and Chipperfield, the designer’s role must remain separate. Akirov’s recurring contribution is not stylistic authorship but the commissioning framework: select the building, finance the intervention, choose the professional team and determine the investment horizon.
38 · THE SET
For years Alrov’s European assets were grouped through The Set, linking Conservatorium, Café Royal and Lutetia while preserving their individual names. The model suited Akirov’s preference for distinct landmark houses. The collection provided institutional coherence without turning the hotels into visually identical branches.
39 · OWNER-OPERATOR DISCIPLINE
The 2022 JLL Lutetia valuation described the hotel as owner-operated through the owner’s management arm, The Set Hotel Group. This matters because Akirov was not merely a passive landlord collecting rent from an external chain. For a significant period, the family group carried both real-estate and operating exposure.
40 · THE LIMIT OF OWNER-OPERATION
Owner-operation offers control but also concentrates risk and requires deep service expertise. A real-estate family can finance architecture more easily than it can institutionalize thousands of daily guest interactions across countries. The 2025–2026 shift toward Mandarin Oriental management at Lutetia and Conservatorium can therefore be read as an evolution of the model rather than a repudiation of it.
41 · 2024 — A NEW OPERATING CHOICE
In December 2024 Mandarin Oriental announced options to take management of Lutetia and Conservatorium. The announcement quoted Akirov as founder and presented the agreement as a way to bring new energy to the heritage hotels. Because the transaction had conditions, the Library should distinguish the announcement from the later completed transitions.
42 · 2025 — LUTETIA CHANGES OPERATOR
Mandarin Oriental officially assumed management of Lutetia on 3 April 2025. The Akirov family remained owner. The change is significant: the asset no longer needed to prove independence by operating alone. Ownership, capital and heritage stewardship could remain with the family while service delivery moved to a global ultra-luxury operator.
43 · 2026 — CONSERVATORIUM FOLLOWS
On 14 January 2026 the Conservatorium became Mandarin Oriental Conservatorium, Amsterdam. The rebranding ceremony included members of the Akirov family as owners. This completes a second step in the same transition: landmark ownership retained, operational platform outsourced to a specialist with global distribution and service systems.
44 · WHY CAFÉ ROYAL IS DIFFERENT
Hotel Café Royal remains a useful counterpoint because it still presents itself as part of The Set. The European portfolio is therefore no longer governed by one single management formula. Akirov’s mature model has become plural: some assets sit under a major operator while another retains the independent collection structure.
45 · GEORGY AKIROV
Alrov’s current management page lists Georgy Akirov as director of hotel operations. The succession signal matters. Alfred’s People card should not absorb the work of the next generation. By 2025–2026 ownership announcements around Lutetia and Conservatorium visibly involve the Akirov family, and Georgy increasingly appears as the hospitality representative.
46 · FAMILY OWNERSHIP AS INSTITUTION
A founder-led company eventually has to become an institution or remain dependent on one person’s judgement. Alrov is now useful as a succession case: Alfred established the investment thesis, while family and professional management increasingly carry hotel operations, financing and external-operator relationships.
47 · THE CAPITAL AUTHORSHIP BOUNDARY
Akirov is wealthy and controls substantial property assets, but wealth alone does not satisfy the Library’s admission rule. His authorship is visible where capital was transformed into a distinct hospitality proposition: Mamilla’s street, the two Jerusalem hotels, the deep restoration of Lutetia, and the reuse of historic buildings in London and Amsterdam.
48 · WHY NOT JUST AN INVESTOR
A passive investor can own a hotel without changing what the guest experiences. Akirov repeatedly took development risk, commissioned major design work and altered the physical and operating identity of assets. That does not make him the architect or general manager, but it moves him beyond financial ownership into place authorship.
49 · THE PATIENCE PREMIUM
Many of Akirov’s defining projects require long periods of non-obvious value creation: Mamilla took more than a decade; Lutetia closed for years; Café Royal demanded a heritage conversion; Conservatorium required a national monument to become a modern hotel. The transferable model is patience as part of luxury capital.
50 · INDEPENDENCE AS VALUE
Alrov’s European strategy originally treated independence itself as an asset. Distinctive names could preserve local memory and avoid being flattened by a global flag. The later Mandarin Oriental agreements demonstrate the counter-lesson: independence has value only if ownership can also secure service consistency, distribution and operating depth.
51 · BRAND VERSUS BUILDING
Akirov’s portfolio repeatedly puts the building ahead of the brand. Lutetia, Café Royal and Conservatorium already had or acquired identities tied to place. The group’s job was to make those buildings economically viable as luxury hotels. This is the reverse of a chain model in which a brand searches for real estate to carry a pre-existing operating template.
52 · ARCHITECTURE AS CAPITAL EXPENDITURE
The choice of Safdie, Lissoni, Chipperfield and Wilmotte shows that architecture is treated as a long-life capital investment rather than a styling layer. For a landmark hotel, design expenditure is expected to extend the economic life of the asset, improve room-rate potential and reinforce the address as a destination.
53 · SERVICE AS THE UNOWNABLE PART
Real estate can be bought. Service cannot be stored in the balance sheet in the same way. Akirov’s evolution from direct operation toward selective external management reveals the asymmetry at the heart of luxury hospitality: an owner may control stone, leasehold and capital, but guest memory depends on people, routines and culture.
54 · HOTEL AND CITY
Akirov’s best work blurs the distinction between hotel and city. The David Citadel frames Jerusalem; Mamilla Hotel sits inside a pedestrian network; Conservatorium borrows the cultural density of Museumplein; Café Royal borrows Regent Street and Soho; Lutetia borrows Saint-Germain. Each asset uses the city as part of the service proposition.
55 · LOCAL IDENTITY WITHOUT LOCAL OPERATOR
The Mandarin Oriental transitions at Lutetia and Conservatorium test a modern luxury problem: can a global operator improve service and distribution without erasing local identity? The agreements explicitly promise preservation of each hotel’s character. Whether that promise holds over time is an operational question the Library should continue to observe.
56 · CRISIS EXPOSURE
Hotel ownership carries risks that pure trophy-asset narratives often omit. Alrov’s financial reports document severe disruption to Jerusalem hotel operations after October 2023 and earlier pandemic closures across Israel and Europe. The portfolio demonstrates that landmark status does not remove geopolitical, health, labour or demand risk.
57 · WHAT MAMILLA SOLVED
Mamilla solved several problems at once: a difficult urban seam became walkable; historic fabric was reintegrated; two luxury hotels gained a shared destination; parking was moved below grade; retail received a strong pedestrian address; and the Old City became reachable through a contemporary public route. No single building explains the result.
58 · WHAT MAMILLA DID NOT SOLVE
The project does not eliminate disputes about commercialisation, preservation, public space or who benefits from redevelopment. A successful luxury district can still be privately controlled and economically selective. The Library should record its spatial and hospitality achievements without presenting development as politically or socially neutral.
59 · AKIROV AND MOSHE SAFDIE
Safdie is the architect-author; Akirov is the developer-author. Their records should cross-link because Mamilla depends on both roles. Safdie supplied the urban and architectural grammar. Akirov supplied the long-term development vehicle, capital commitment and completion discipline after earlier versions of the project had stalled.
60 · AKIROV AND PIERO LISSONI
Lissoni enters the story at the level of atmosphere and adaptive reuse. His work at Mamilla and Conservatorium shows Akirov’s preference for restrained contemporary design inside historic or stone-heavy contexts. The relationship also demonstrates that a developer can create portfolio coherence through repeated collaborators without imposing one corporate style.
61 · COMPARISON — ADRIAN CHENG
Adrian Cheng uses culture, retail and hospitality to make mixed-use districts desirable, especially through K11 and Victoria Dockside. Akirov’s method is older and more real-estate-led. Cheng foregrounds cultural programming and brand ecosystem; Akirov foregrounds location, stone, heritage and long ownership. Both treat the district rather than the individual hotel as the larger product.
62 · COMPARISON — ZHANG XIN
Zhang Xin is another developer admitted for architectural patronage rather than design authorship. Zhang used contemporary architecture as a forward-facing identity for a rapidly modernizing city. Akirov more often works through heritage, preservation and urban continuity. One commissions the future as spectacle; the other frequently renovates the past into a luxury asset.
63 · COMPARISON — PADDY MCKILLEN
Paddy McKillen’s Maybourne story similarly shows the owner as custodian of expensive urban hotels where architecture, art and restoration drive value. McKillen’s authorship is intensely hotel-specific; Akirov’s most important authorship is the larger Mamilla district, with hotel ownership later extended into European heritage properties.
64 · WHAT HE CHANGED
Akirov demonstrated an Israeli developer route into international luxury hospitality that did not depend on licensing a new global brand. He made urban heritage, prime location and architectural commissioning the portfolio logic; used Mamilla to prove a district-scale version of that logic; and then carried it into heritage hotels in Amsterdam, London and Paris.
65 · WHAT HE DID NOT AUTHOR
He did not design Mamilla, the David Citadel, Mamilla Hotel, Conservatorium, Café Royal or Lutetia. He did not create their historic legacies. He did not personally operate every hotel service or restore every protected detail. Safdie, Lissoni, Chipperfield, Wilmotte, hotel teams, public agencies, contractors and later Mandarin Oriental retain independent authorship.
66 · THE HOUSE AND THE PERSON
LHL-665 · Alrov Properties should carry the corporate history, ownership structure and broader portfolio. LHL-P-521 should answer a different question: what decisions made Akirov an author of hospitality places, and why did Mamilla become the project that best explains his method? The records should link without duplicating each other.
67 · ANCHOR RECOMMENDATION — MAMILLA
The current register search did not verify a dedicated code for Mamilla Hotel or Mamilla as a district. Because the People card is fundamentally about Mamilla, the Library should create or confirm a place / house anchor before publication. The code must be issued through the register, not invented in this master.
68 · SECONDARY CONNECTION — THE SET COLLECTION
LHL-020 · The Set Collection is a useful secondary connection because Mamilla joined the collection and the European hotels were historically organized through The Set. It is not the primary anchor for Akirov because the person’s authorship predates the collection and extends beyond it.
69 · SECONDARY CONNECTION — MOSHE SAFDIE
LHL-P-519 · Moshe Safdie should be linked directly. The previous Safdie master establishes Mamilla as one of his major hospitality and urban projects. Reading P-519 and P-521 together clarifies the Library’s core distinction between architectural authorship and developer authorship.
70 · PEOPLE CANDIDATE — GEORGY AKIROV
Georgy Akirov merits a People candidate review because Alrov currently identifies him as director of hotel operations and he appears publicly as owner representative in the Mandarin Oriental transition. Admission should depend on evidence of independent authorship in operations or succession, not simply family relationship.
71 · PEOPLE CANDIDATE — PIERO LISSONI
Piero Lissoni is already a major hospitality designer across several LHL-relevant houses and should be checked against the current People register. In Akirov’s portfolio alone he links Mamilla, Conservatorium and the later Café Royal lobby, making him more than a supplier attached to one property.
72 · TIMELINE
1941 — born in Iraq. 1970s–1980s — business activity includes property and hotel-related interests recorded by Globes. 1978 — founds Alrov Israel. 1983 — Alrov Israel floats on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange. 1993 — Alrov Properties and Lodgings is floated. 1994 — Alrov enters the Mamilla project with a 50% acquisition from Ladbroke. 1996 — Alrov acquires full rights in the project. 1998 — David Citadel Hotel opens. 2001 — Alrov begins overseas operations through PIH. 2006 — group formally decides to build a luxury-hotel portfolio in Europe and Israel. 2007 — Mamilla Avenue opens. 2008 — Café Royal redevelopment agreement with the Crown Estate; European hotel programme accelerates. 2009 — Mamilla Hotel opens. 2010 — Alrov acquires Hôtel Lutetia. 2011–2012 — Conservatorium opens after transformation of the Amsterdam landmark. 2012–2013 — Hotel Café Royal opens progressively. 2014 — Lutetia closes for major restoration. 2018 — Lutetia reopens after approximately €190 million investment. 2024 — Mandarin Oriental announces proposed management agreements for Lutetia and Conservatorium. 3 April 2025 — Mandarin Oriental assumes management of Lutetia. 14 January 2026 — Conservatorium becomes Mandarin Oriental Conservatorium, Amsterdam. 2026 — Akirov remains Chairman of Alrov Properties and Lodgings; the family remains owner of the two rebranded European hotels.
73 · ⚑ CANDOUR
Founder sources. Several biographical and strategic claims come from Alrov or Akirov interviews and should be treated as primary-source testimony, not independent evaluation. Birth. Alrov confirms the year 1941; the Iraqi birthplace is reported by Globes and other biographies. Mamilla authorship. Akirov is not the original planner and did not design the district. Safdie’s work began before Alrov entered; public authorities and earlier partners were essential. Project politics. Mamilla’s long history includes state and municipal institutions, preservation disputes and competing urban interests. This master records operationally relevant facts without assigning motives beyond sourced statements. Hotel authorship. Safdie, Lissoni, Chipperfield and Wilmotte retain architectural and design authorship. Operating authorship. Hotel GMs, staff and later Mandarin Oriental retain service authorship. The Set. The operating and brand structure evolved over time and should not be projected backward as if it existed unchanged from the first European acquisition. Current management. Lutetia has been managed by Mandarin Oriental since April 2025; Conservatorium since January 2026. Ownership remains with the Akirov family. Café Royal. It remains presented within The Set and should not be described as Mandarin Oriental. Admission. Akirov is admitted for place-making, long-horizon redevelopment and the conversion of landmark real estate into hospitality institutions — not for wealth, political proximity or portfolio size.