Westferry Circus after dark: the Wharf hotel that faces the Thames

The western edge of the estate

Walk west from Cabot Square along West India Avenue and the towers stop abruptly. The avenue ends at Westferry Circus, a two-level roundabout with a round, tree-lined garden on its upper deck and the traffic moving quietly underneath. Past the garden and down the steps, the ground simply runs out at the Thames. Canary Riverside Plaza stands there on the bank, low and wide, the only large hotel on the Wharf whose front door belongs to the river.

It opened as a Four Seasons at the end of the 1990s, when half the estate was still scaffolding, and a few long-serving guests still call it by the old name. The building shares its stretch of bank with residential blocks, a small cluster of restaurants and Canary Wharf Pier, where the river buses call. Across the water sits Rotherhithe. Behind, a few hundred metres away, stand the offices. From most river-facing rooms you would hardly know they were there.

That is the whole idea of the place. Everything else on the estate faces inward, towards the squares and the docks. This hotel faces out.

Who chooses the river side

The guests who book it tend to know the Wharf already. They have stayed near the squares, eaten beside the dock, and want the next trip to feel less like an extension of the office. Bankers in town for a week of meetings take river rooms so that the view at eleven at night is water and slow barges rather than a colleague's lit window. Couples visiting for a weekend like it because the Thames Path runs past the door, heading west towards Limehouse and south around the island.

For an evening with a companion the appeal is simpler still. The lobby is calm. People arriving at eight in good clothes are unremarkable. There is no crowd to cross, no queue at a bank of lifts, nobody from your floor having a drink by the entrance. It suits a first booking, when a guest wants the arrival to be as quiet as it can possibly be, and it suits a regular who just likes to fall asleep near moving water.

Reaching Westferry Circus

From the Jubilee line, head for Cabot Square and follow West India Avenue west; the walk is short, well under ten minutes at an easy pace. From the Elizabeth line under Crossrail Place the route is a little longer, around the dock and through the squares. On the DLR, both Canary Wharf and West India Quay work, and from either you simply keep walking until the buildings give way to the river.

The river is the more interesting approach. Canary Wharf Pier lies beside the hotel, served by the Thames Clippers river buses from the City, Westminster and Greenwich, and by a short cross-river ferry to Rotherhithe. Arriving by water at dusk, with the towers switching on behind the pier, is a very good way to begin an evening, and it takes about as long as the Tube.

By car, a cab from the West End at night usually comes east on The Highway, dives into the Limehouse Link, then loops down from the circus to the hotel entrance without a tour of the estate on the way.

How a visit there comes together

The booking takes the same three lines it takes anywhere on the Wharf. Message the desk with the hotel, the hour you want her and how long for: an hour, two, the four hours of a dinner by the dock, or a full night. Philippa, or whoever is holding the night desk, replies with a companion's name, the fee and a single question about the room.

Then comes the one check we make. Three things are confirmed on WhatsApp, once: the full name on the reservation, which hotel, which room. They travel no further than that message. With the check done you receive an arrival time you can plan the evening around. From confirmation, allow up to an hour; with a day's notice you can name the minute yourself.

She walks in through the lobby like any other guest who is meeting someone, and either comes straight up or finds you in the bar, whichever you asked for. Nothing about her clothes announces anything. She is dressed for dinner by the river, because that may well be what happens next. The full shape of an estate hotel booking, including what to do when a meeting overruns, is set out on the hotel visits after the close page.

Three evenings the river makes easy

The short one. Two hours, beginning in the room with a drink while the river turns dark, then down to the promenade for a slow walk along the water and back again. The lights of Rotherhithe opposite are low and domestic; the barges and the river buses provide the movement.

The dinner. Gaucho sits in the same riverside complex, so the whole evening can happen without a coat: Argentine beef, plenty of Malbec, and a window on the pier. For a wider choice, the restaurants around Wood Wharf and the squares are ten or fifteen minutes' walk east, and four hours leave room for the walk, the table and the long way home along the dock.

The crossing. Take the pier ferry over to Rotherhithe for a drink on the south bank, at the bar by the landing stage or further along Rotherhithe Street, then come back across with the whole estate lit up in front of you. It is the best view of the towers anyone can arrange for the cost of a short boat ride, and it turns a hotel evening into something that feels like a small journey.

Companions suited to a river hotel

Liana is our first suggestion for a quiet night here. She reads a guest within minutes, prefers rooms where the noise stays low and will walk the promenade without needing to fill every silence. Samanta, who keeps a private notebook on the hotels she visits and scores them on their lighting and their staircases, will have a verdict on the lobby before the lift arrives. Patricia is the one for a misty evening: she stops on the river path to study the water, and quite possibly to paint it.

All three appear among our slim and slender companions, and each travels in from the west of London, which puts Westferry Circus comfortably inside the travel we include. For a longer walk along the river, the Limehouse page covers the stretch between the hotel and Narrow Street; for everything on the estate itself, start with Canary Wharf.

When the evening is clear in your head, send it to booking with the hotel, the time and the name you would like. Each length and its fee is on the rates page, from £250 for the first hour.