On the morning of 8 June the most photographed pool in Rio went quiet. When it fills again, the wing above it will be all suites, and five of its floors will belong to wellbeing.
The Copacabana Palace has held its stretch of Avenida Atlântica since 1923, a white landmark facing the full sweep of Copacabana Beach. Marlene Dietrich stayed. So did Orson Welles, Brigitte Bardot, Princess Diana and the Rolling Stones. The guest book reads like the century’s credits.
Now Belmond is rebuilding the part of the hotel where that history sunbathed. In November 2026 the house will reveal its renovated Pool Wing, the annex added in 1948 above the pool and the lounging terrace that together form the hotel’s social heart. The work is already underway; the main pool closed on 8 June and stays drained until September.
The wing
The Pool Wing returns as an all-suite address. Every suite gains a balcony, and most look down onto the pool and out toward the beach. Interiors draw on Brazilian materials and artisanal technique, rooting the wing in Carioca craft rather than imported polish.
The larger shift is wellness. Five floors of the wing will be given over entirely to wellbeing, a commitment few city hotels anywhere have matched. The spa has moved into the main building while the work proceeds, and salon treatments continue in the room on request.
The pool
The terrace itself goes to the Brazilian architect Ivan Rezende, who will redraw the pool area around a new hotel bar. A new boutique arrives with it, and the hotel’s contemporary Italian restaurant is being rethought as part of the same chapter.
A century of Rio mornings has started beside this pool. The next one gets balconies.
The Splendid EditLife at the Palace carries on around the work. Guests swim in a dedicated pool on the sixth floor until September, and the main building is untouched. Mee still holds its Michelin star for pan-Asian cooking and stocks sixty imported sakes, Pérgula still lays out its Saturday feijoada, and the Piano Bar keeps its place on the Rio evening.
The Copacabana Palace above Avenida Atlântica — Courtesy of Belmond
The verdict
Hotels this famous renovate at their peril; the regulars notice everything. Belmond is betting that suites, balconies and five floors of wellbeing are what the next era of guests will ask of a 1948 annex. The pool stays exactly where it has always been, which is the part that matters.
The renovated Pool Wing and pool area at the Copacabana Palace, A Belmond Hotel, Rio de Janeiro, will be revealed in November 2026. The hotel remains open throughout; belmond.com.
Photography courtesy of Belmond — Copacabana Palace, Rio de Janeiro