Six Senses Duxton, Singapore opens: Inside the Anouska Hempel-designed five-star hotel

Anouska Hempel, the only Bond Girl ever to hail from Australia, an "It Girl" before the term was even invented, is now 76 years old and one of the world's top architectural style icons. When she arrived in Singapore at 10pm after a 14-hour flight from her home in London, to inspect the fixtures and fittings of the new five-star boutique hotel she'd designed, everyone expected her to sleep.

Hempel, however, did no such thing. "She was inspecting things and fixing everything until midnight," says Marina Mathews, spokeswoman at the newly-unveiled Six Senses Duxton. "She only does the occasional project – her passion projects – and when she's working on them, it seems she has the energy of a 26-year-old!"

This project, the first city hotel from the Six Senses hospitality and wellness company, certainly bears witness to that passion. The redesign of a row of eight early-19th-century traditional shophouses into a slick modern hotel close to the centre of Chinatown has become a stunning shrine to good taste, while also winning a national architectural heritage award.

It's the latest hotel hit from the model and actor turned designer who went to school in Sydney's south before moving to England in the swinging 1960s with just £10 to her name. The woman who went on to play opposite George Lazenby's Bond in On Her Majesty's Secret Service, later launched one of the world's first luxury boutique hotels, Blake's in London, in 1978, and now has a string of successful establishments behind her. This new 49-room heritage addition in Singapore is just as spectacular. Going through the front doors, you enter a sleek Chinese-Malay-European world of black lacquer, gold and yellow with Chinese screens, wallpaper made from reproduced old land contracts from the 1700s, and calligraphy brushes of all shapes and sizes.

Screened off to one side are the 50-seat Yellow Pot modern Chinese restaurant and the striking 20-seat antiquarian-themed cocktail bar with its heritage stained-glass ceiling, mustard, black and gold colour theme, and objets d'art from Hempel's own collection from around the world. On first sight, it took a few moments to realise I hadn't actually drawn breath, so taken aback was I by the vision of pure, unadulterated glamour. But it's not only about the form. The giant Chinese script in gold by the entrance – translating as Prosperity, Happiness and Health, and Longevity – reminds us that this is a Six Senses hotel that wants its guests to leave healthier than when they arrive.

That mission starts from the beginning, too, when you're invited to take off your shoes and step into a giant bronze Himalayan singing bowl for a few moments of quiet mindfulness. As you stand there, with your eyes closed, the bowl is struck with a gong and the vibrations pulse through you, so you don't actually even have the space to think of anything else. There's a normal-sized singing bowl in every room as well, to allow you to continue the practice.

Every guest is also invited to a personal consultation with a physician of traditional Chinese medicine. Happily, mine gave me the all-clear. Sadly, I fared less well with the outdoor yoga class … but there was plenty of individual tuition to stop me falling behind.