The hotel’s design by Hirsch Bedner Associates pays tribute to Xiamen’s tropical surroundings, natural beauty of its harbor and its transformation from an industrial port city to a modern music mecca. Here, the mixing of people over millennia has inspired an idiosyncratic culture that embraces wildly varied musical forms and young, rebellious attitudes which W Xiamen captures through show-stopping digital installations and specially commissioned art pieces.

At W the Store, the iconic look of Gaojia opera singers is reimagined as contemporary art, with hypnotic faces rendered in oil paint on curved metal walls. Before stepping into the Living Room (W’s signature take on the lobby), guests find themselves in an electric forest made of neon glass pillars, their hushed stillness contrasted with sudden bursts of flute notes played every time guests approach the lobby centerpiece — an interactive art piece inspired by the musical instruments displayed at a local organ museum.

Among the highlights of W Xiamen’s 293 guest rooms and suites are feature walls that use digitally rendered artworks to bring the city’s tropical nature indoors by means of RGB (red-green-blue) illustrations that work as a color puzzle with pieces falling into place once the ambient light shifts from one color to the next, as well as consoles and coffee tables inspired by Bo Bing, a popular local dice game. The Extreme WOW Suite is a 262-square-meter contemporary art-filled venue that sets the scene for private parties. An expansive entertainment area is anchored by a plush L-shaped sofa, and the suite’s party trick activates with a flick of a switch, amping up the drama with underwater ripples across the room.