Glasgow Travel Guide
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CitizenM Coming to Glasgow, With Amsterdam-Made Rooms
We already heard that the innovative pod-ness that is the Citizen M hotel chain is planning on opening the CitizenM Glasgow sometime around October next year, but now we're hearing more info about it.
The Scottish version of CitizenM will have 180 rooms and they're building it next to the Theatre Royal. Well, in fact, they're building most of it in Amsterdam: all the "pod" rooms will actually be built in a factory in Amsterdam, then shipped to Glasgow and "slotted into place on top of each other". Neat.
The marketing fizz is always that CitizenM is "affordable luxury"--affordable in Glasgow apparently means rooms starting from £54 (US$100) which we have to agree is reasonable. Since CitizenM plans to have these identical rooms wherever they build their hotels, you can pretty much refer to our in-depth Amsterdam review to figure out if you'll like the Glasgow version or not. Easy, isn't it?
[Photo of CitizenM Amsterdam room: Sacred Destinations]
Tags: Anti-View / Glasgow Hotels / Abode Hotels / → All Tags
Room With an Anti-View: The View From The ABode Hotel is ATrocious
You know the scene. You open the door to your brand new hotel room, run over to the window, open the blinds and bam, you are hit with the anti-view. Maybe you are looking down a dirty alley, witnessing a drug deal, staring at an air shaft in the face, or seeing a brick wall. Whatever you are viewing it is not extremely pleasurable. Help out your fellow hotel mavens by uploading your anti-views to the HotelChatter/Flickr photo pool, or by sending the photo along to us. Remember to tell us the name of the hotel and the room number with the not-so-easy-on-the-eyes view.
Maybe we're not being fair to Glasgow's ABode Hotel. First, we complained that its enviable rooms aren't up to enviable standard, and we also whined about its weird capitalization thing.
And now we're slamming an Anti-View tag on it, although that's pretty well deserved when you see this pretty shocking view over an awful air vent system and some dirty walls.
However, Glasgow fans tell us that the ABode has a funky bar and is in a good location, so it ain't all bad. They've got bed and breakfast deals going for £75 (US$145) a room at the moment (in a Comfortable-level room) but we're presuming these cheaper deals run you the risk of getting stuck with this view.
[Photo: ManxQueenies]
Tags: Scotland Hotels / Glasgow Hotels / Art Hotels / Abode Hotels / → All Tags
ABode Glasgow Has "Enviable" Rooms That We Don't Envy
There's one thing that instantly annoys us about the ABode Hotel Glasgow: that arty capitalization of the second letter. Any self-respecting word processing software immediately whips that "B" into a lowercase letter, and so it should, we think.
But let's get beyond such pedantic issues for a second. The ABode in Glasgow has promise: we like that its 59 rooms are classified into four levels, comfortable, desirable, enviable and fabulous. (Much like W Hotels categories of rooms--wonderful, spectacular, fabulous, mega, wow, etc.")
Plus, it's centrally located near train stations and they give you free WiFi in the café. So far so good.
Tags: Anti-View / Scotland Hotels / → All Tags
Room With an Anti-View: The Dirty Walls of Glasgow
You know the scene. You open the door to your brand new hotel room, run over to the window, open the blinds and bam, you are hit with the anti-view. Maybe you are looking down a dirty alley, witnessing a drug deal, staring at an air shaft in the face, or seeing a brick wall. Whatever you are viewing it is not extremely pleasurable. Help out your fellow hotel mavens by uploading your anti-views to the HotelChatter/Flickr photo pool, or by sending the photo along to us. Remember to tell us the name of the hotel and the room number with the not-so-easy-on-the-eyes view.
You'd have to check a lot of our Anti-Views to find a view as bad as this one from the Ramada Glasgow City Hotel in Scotland. As disappointed visitor to Glasgow Cellach discovered, it wasn't only the view that failed to be first class last month:
When the web site said "We are currently undertaking some minor refurbishments, we hope you won't be inconvenienced during your stay" the alarm bells should have rung. I tripped over the pile of paint cans on the way into my room last night and ate my breakfast this morning accompanied by the sound of power tools and some impressive Glaswegian cursing. The whole place (food included) was covered in a fine layer of dust. If I tell you it didn't do much to impair the flavour you might get the general idea...
Presumably some rooms have a better outlook than a grubby brick wall but it still might be better to what until the refurb's over.
[Photo: Cellach]
Related Stories:
· Hotels in Glasgow [HotelChatter]
· Travel Stories in Scotland [Jaunted]
Tags: Anti-View / Scotland Hotels / → All Tags
Room with an Anti-View: Train Tracks At Jurys Inn Glasgow
You know the scene. You open the door to your brand new hotel room, run over to the window, open the blinds and bam, you are hit with the anti-view. Maybe you are looking down a dirty alley, witnessing a drug deal, staring at an air shaft in the face, or seeing a brick wall. Whatever you are viewing it is not extremely pleasurable. Help out your fellow hotel mavens by uploading your anti-views to the HotelChatter/Flickr photo pool, or by sending the photo along to us. Remember to tell us the name of the hotel and the room number with the not-so-easy-on-the-eyes view.
Unless you're some kind of trainspotting freak, then this view from rooms at the back of Jurys Inn Glasgow would probably not be to your liking.
The pro of having a bunch of train tracks right outside your window, of course, is that your hotel is in a really central location.
Anti-View spotter wilko1978 says that Jurys Inn also has friendly staff, great air-conditioning and ice dispensing machines on every second floor (apparently that's good enough for him) but the food, internet and phone calls were expensive. And then there's that terrible view.
[Photo: wilko1978]
Related Stories:
· Travel Stories in Glasgow [Jaunted]
· Hotels in Glasgow [HotelChatter]
Tags: Hotel News / Ken McCulloch / Scotland Hotel Reviews / → All Tags
Meat Trolleys Return to One Devonshire Gardens
Yesterday we looked at Scottish hotelier Ken McCulloch who started his hotel career by opening Scotland first boutique hotel, One Devonshire Gardens Hotel. However, the place was recently sold to the upscale UK group, Hotels du Vin. With the pairing comes a new bistro that Hotel du Vin is so known for, while at the same time one that takes careful consideration to Devonshire Gardens' past.
Sticking true to the preferences of its people, guests can expect a trolley lunch at the bistro's opening tomorrow and the trolley will be there to stay. (What is with the U.K. and their trolleys?)
Hotel du Vin will also be supplying alcohol as wine is now a major highlight at the bistro and Again, sticking to tradition, the bistro will feature Sunday afternoon tea hours as well as a roast.
After all this gorging guests can relax in the 5-star quality that One Devonshire Gardens has always provided. A few new changes by Hotel du Vin include, big surprise, a wine theme. You'd really think the Hotel du Vin group came out of France or Italy. But nope, U.K. it is and soon this Scottish hotel will have some brand new rooms to go along with their tasty trolley and stocked whisky room:
While the restaurant has been given its own new look, the rest of the hotel is also being revamped, with Hotel du Vin spending £11.5m on the purchase and refurbishment. A total of 14 new bedrooms are being created, with each named after a different wine. In the whisky bar, bistro and main bar, paintings and iconic photographs of vineyards and wine bottles hang on the walls.
Despite all the wine themes and upgrading, it's nice to hear the hotel is sticking to its old world charms. Those are really the only reason anyone goes to Scotland anyway--for the Scottish accents and meat trolleys.
Related Stories:
· Return to tradition for luxury hotel [The Herald]
· One Devonshire Gardens Reviews [TripAdvisor]
· Hot Scottish Hotelier News: Ken McCulloch [HotelChatter]
Tags: Hotel Hell / → All Tags
Problems With Overbooking at Manor Park
[Ed Note: Hotel Maven Karin recently visited the Manor Park Hotel in Prestwick where she discovered the hotel has a problem with overbooking. Enjoy.]
Early August 2006, we booked and paid for, accommodation at The Manor Park Hotel in Prestwick for 26 August. The booking was confirmed. When we arrived, we found that no room was available. The hotel manager gave us a convoluted story about putting us somewhere quieter because there was a function at his hotel.
However, it turned out that this was not the issue, but that he had overbooked. After telephoning around other hotels for nearly 2 hours, the hotel staff took us to a private country house. The owner of this was a very pleasant gentleman, but the room had only one double and one single bed. Meanwhile, it was midnight and we had two very tired children with us. We had no choice but to stay and squeezed ourselves into the available beds.
Although an employee of the Manor Park Hotel provided a folding bed, this was so uncomfortable that none of us were able to use it.
This happened not only to us, but to 3 Swedish couples who had also made and prepaid their reservations.
Related Stories:
· Manor Park Hotel reviews [TripAdvisor]
Tags: Tips / → All Tags
Scottish By Birth, British By Law
Daniel Altman has an interesting piece in the NY Times, in which he poses a high-end hospitality trickle down theory.
Two or three different Scottish hotels are cited in the story:
Brunswick Glasgow
ArtHouse
Langs Hotel (pictured to the right)
Because Glasgow may not be at the top of tourists' lists of places to visit, the hotel itself had to become the destination. "A lot of people come not just to come to Glasgow, said Cathy Owen, sales and marketing manager at Langs Hotel in Glasgow, but to Langs, because we offer a lot of packages," including romantic weekends and pajama parties, she said. Other Glasgow hotels, like the ArtHouse, have become as popular for their bars and restaurants as for their rooms.
Jeez, these Scottish hoteliers really get it, don't they? First they snag a couple of design awards, and now they are totally on top of the destination hotel thing.
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