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Chicago Hotel Scene: The Hotel Blake

Go To The Hotel's Web Site Where: 500 S. Dearborn Street [map], Chicago, il, United States, 60605
April 12, 2007 at 9:22 AM | by juliana | 5 Comments

This week we will be looking at some Chicago hotels, largely because we realized that we have New York, Miami, Los Angeles and San Fran well-covered but really nothing on the Windy City. If you have a question about the city's hotel scene, send it our way and we'll investigate. Even better, if you have hotel recommendation, we wanna hear it.

A tipster wrote in to us yesterday with a bunch of recommendations for Chicago hotels, thus earning a gold star and a strawberry scratch-n-sniff sticker for helping us with the Chicago hotel scene coverage.

Our friend writes:

I lived in Chicago for one year, and the James Hotel in the Loop, after the first few months, is an incredible luxury hotel. Especially when you have the Peninsula and the Park Hyatt just down the street, starting at around $600 a night. The James starts around $250. The Four Seasons is fabulous, as is the Hilton in the South Loop. There is also a pretty new hotel in the South Loop, named the Hotel Blake, with quite a unique restaurant.

Since we've written quite a bit about the James Hotel, we thought we would check in on the Blake, especially now that Nicky O plans for the hotel seem to be in the toilet.

Last month, we liked the Blake for its Good Rate of $129 and recent reviewers like the hotel's convenient location, "2 blks from the Blue Line, 2 blocks from the Red Line, and 2 blocks from the elevated loop trains." Also making guests happy were the free wireless, a "rain shower" shower head, and iPod docks.

Sadly, this hotel has some bad things about it. For starters, there are no dressers, only a tiny closet. Others complained about noise, slow elevators, poor service and some of the room furniture was in bad condition.

Meanwhile, the Custom House restaurant attached to the restaurant got rave reviews and if you're too tired to make it downstairs, they bring the menu to you for room service.

Related Stories:
· Hotel Blake reviews [TripAdvisor]

5 Comments

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  1. langtry

    HotelChatter Member

    The Hotel James & The Hotel Blake

    No offense to your friend, Juliana, but The James is not in Chicago's Loop.  You need to be south or east of the Chicago River to be in the Loop, and The James is north of it.  It's off the "Magnificent Mile", in River North, or Northbridge, depending on who you talk to.

    Also, according to a friend in the Chicago commercial real estate community, rumor has it that The Blake will close unless a buyer can be found. Said buyer is nowhere to be found, he added, because no one wants to business with the developer trying to sell The Blake.

    April 12, 2007 at 10:07 AM
    #Permalink

  1. juliana

    HotelChatter Editor

    Thank you!

    So since you are Chicago-savvy, what hotel would you recommend for people visiting?
    April 12, 2007 at 10:29 AM
    #Permalink

  1. v1perdmx

    HotelChatter Member

    Re: Chicago Hotel Scene: The Hotel Blake

    Hotel Burnham, across the street from what was Marshall Field's, is another great Chicago Hotel.
    April 12, 2007 at 11:30 AM
    #Permalink

  1. langtry

    HotelChatter Member

    Re: Chicago Hotel Scene: The Hotel Blake

    I agree with the poster above, that the Hotel Burnham is an excellent choice, especially if one is an architecture buff.  The hotel was a complete rehab that the City of Chicago sponsored when they were trying to draw businesses to State Street, and I remember what terrible shape the old Reliance Building was in before it became The Burnham: it's amazing how great it is now.  One caveat to this recommendation, however: there is a massive construction project taking place directly accross the street from the hotel, so views overlooking Washington Street are likely to be noisy during the day and less-than-"view-licious" in the evening.

    There are a number of hotels that are great in Chicago: my favorite would be the Peninsula, Westin or Park Hyatt for Michigan Avenue; the Sofitel Chicago Water Tower for style and scene; the Hotel Indigo (Gold Coast) for feeling like a posh local (it's in the same neighborhood I live in: alas, I live in a not-so-posh Studio); the InterContinental Chicago for it's amazing pool; and in the summer, The Drake for it's amazing Lake Michigan views and close proximity to Oak Street Beach.  

    April 12, 2007 at 1:16 PM
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  1. juliana

    HotelChatter Editor

    Sofitels...

    It's funny, I never really paid much attention to Sofitels but they always rank high in big cities. That said, if anyone wanted to visit Los Angeles I would recommend the Sofitel LA b/c it's been recently renovated to look extremely swank, has a great restaurant (Simon LA), Rande Gerber's Stone Rose lounge, and it's a great location for shopaholics--next to Beverly Center and a few blocks away from Robertson Boulevard. But if you had tons of money to spend, hands down it would be the Beverly Hills Hotel. You just can't beat it.
    April 12, 2007 at 1:59 PM
    #Permalink

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