What to know | Hoshino Resorts Opens KAI Zao: 49 Rooms in a Fourteen-Sided Tower

KAI Zao, the new base of Hoshino Resorts Group's hot spring hotel brand "Kai", opened on October 15, 2026 in Zao Onsen, Yamagata Prefecture, Japan. The building adopts a fourteen-sided tower and has a total of 49 guest rooms. The accommodation content is composed of mountain views, hot springs and local craftsmanship. The most important thing to understand first is that the panoramic view from the rooftop is not the same thing as the view from each guest room.

Cover image: 星野集團

The fourteen-sided building allows guest rooms to have different angles

The tower extends from the lobby to the guest rooms, hot springs and top floor space, responding to Zao mountain culture by moving upward. The guest rooms form a trapezoid shape due to the architectural structure, each with different directions and heights. The sunlight and scenery will also change depending on the location. When selecting a room, you should read the specific room type and landscape description. Do not interpret the building's panoramic view to mean that all rooms can see a 360-degree mountain view at the same time.

Incorporating local crafts such as Tendo Mokko furniture into the interior, the Yamagata’s character not only appears outside the window, but also enters the furniture and room details. For travelers who care about design, they can read the space from the relationship between tables, chairs, woodwork, and window views, rather than just treating the hotel as a destination for photographing its appearance.

Hot springs and rooftop spaces, each with different content

Facilities include large public baths, saunas, cold baths, indoor relaxation and rooftop gardens. The bathhouses are marked with different configurations as "0-no-yu", "50-no-yu" and "100-no-yu", and the roof is equipped with a landscape space and a jacuzzi in the image of Zao’s Okama crater. These are facility plans and should not be extended to unproven detox or health benefits.

If the purpose of your stay includes bathing and resting, you can first check the opening hours of each facility, how to use it, and whether the room type has a private bath. Public baths, guest baths and rooftop spaces need to be looked at separately. Just because a bath appears in the photo, it cannot be assumed that each room type has the same facilities.

Safflower culture extends from restaurants to local experiences

The dinner is based on Yamagata safflower merchant culture and local ingredients. The announced banquet includes a vermilion lacquer plate and a Gassan Nabe that combines cress, mushrooms and duck meat. Ingredients and menus may be adjusted according to seasons and plans, and should be confirmed with actual check-in arrangements.

The hotel also plans an activity to connect haiku with safflower tea, local history and glass pen. Rather than concentrating all the experiences into one time period, you can first look at the dinner, bathing and activity times, and then leave time for admiring the light and resting, so that the accommodation is not just about completing the list of facilities one by one.

Starting from 31,000 yen, is it per person or per room?

The accommodation price announced in the opening information is when two people stay in the same room, starting from 31,000 yen per person, including tax and breakfast and dinner; this is not the total price of the entire double room. The actual date, room type and plan will affect the amount, and the starting price cannot be directly applied to all accommodation arrangements.

The hotel address is Zao Onsen 903-2, Yamagata City. VisitKAI Zao official websiteCheck the room type, meals and transportation, and confirm the price based on the date of stay. The fourteen-sided tower provides design recognition. What really affects the journey is the orientation of the room, the content of the meal and how you want to spend your time in the mountains.