Somerset Maugham made many trips to the Far East, often stopping off for a few days at Raffles Hotel. His first visit took place in 1921 when he was already an established novelist and dramatist. From this visit and other visits in the 1920s and early 1930s, he produced two collections of his short stories - `The Casuarina Tree' and `Ah King'.

Maugham's last and very nostalgic visit to Raffles in 1960 was some 40 years after his first. Maugham was 84 years old and he stayed in Suite 77, now Suite 102, the Somerset Maugham Suite.

Memorabilia displayed in the Somerset Maugham Suite include photographs of Maugham during his last visit and two letters written to the Hotel's then General Manager, Frantz Schutzman. One of the letters gives the Hotel permission to use his famous quotation that Raffles Hotel "stands for all the fables of the Exotic East".