The easyHotel South Kensington (damn you, annoying lower-cased brand names) is not close to the shops we adore at Kensington and Hight Street.
In fact, it's a ways off (about 15 minutes) and we say only attempt the walk when the weather's nice in London.
We actually had a chance to go by this hotel and while rooms are cheap at 25 GBP a night, this is still a budget hotel and rooms are notoriously small.
However, the easyHotel gets pretty solid reviews on TripAdvisor. It seems most guests know what they are in for before they arrive.
A few tips: Guests said that rooms with windows are smaller than the ones without. Internet is £5 an hour and watching the telly will cost you another £10 a day. If you want housekeeping, that's £10 per room and extra towels are £1 a piece. So we really wouldn't recommend booking this place for more than two nights.
On the other hand, skimping on the hotel room does leave you more money for shopping in Kensington.
The Kensington Close Hotel is a lesser-known tucked away on Wrights Lane but it's still merely steps away from all the window shopping of Kensington Street and the tube stop.
Inside the hotel has 550 guestrooms (book a Club Room for free internet service), the Oasis health spa and fitness center (charge of £5), the Blue Smoke steakhouse and the Lions sports bar and grill.
The reviews on the hotel are, at first, all really good. Most guests recognize the place is old but say the staff and the location are two points that would make them return for another stay.
Digging a little deeper, guests complain about the quality of the rooms and the small room sizes. Here's an example of that:
My friend and I booked a room for 6 nights. The first room they gave us was so small that we both kept laughing at the fact that we could reach over and poke each other in the arm from our respective beds. The beds seemed smaller than average twins, my feet hung over the end. (I'm 5'11)
Still, the hotel is not charging those scary London prices. We found a standard double on May 9th for £109 ($217) a night. A single room was available for £99 ($197) a night.
The Copthorne Tara has a good location just off Kensington High Street but the hotel has failed to impress several guests.
A bit about the hotel first: It's massive with 833 guestrooms and it's part of the Millenium Hotels chains so really there's zero personality at this hotel.
Its Bugis Street Brasserie serves authentic Singaporean, Malaysian and Chinese cuisine. There's also a business center, a tiny fitness center and randomly, the hotel has a wedding license which we gather to mean it can host weddings here, not actually marry people off.
However, several guests have complained that the rooms are dirty and the decor is tired. With nearly a 1,000 rooms inside, we aren't surprised. Also of note, Priceline is listing this hotel as 4-star hotel and clearly, several reviewers who booked through the blind bidding site are upset as the room conditions were "unacceptable."
The upsides remain that you can get the hotel for a cheap rate on Priceline (about $110 a night) and that it's super close to the attractions of the Kensington and Hyde Park area. It's also just a short walk to the tube and the shops. We say this place is probably good to book only for one night.
One last tip: If you do need to use internet here, book a room on the club level where internet is gratis. Otherwise you might have to pay close to $40 for internet.
While the neighboring Baglioni Hotel and the Milestone Hotel in Kensington are rather small hotels, the Royal Garden Hotel is enormous, boasting 396 rooms over 10 floors.
The hotel is located just diagonal from the Milestone and on the edge of Hyde Park. It's even closer to all those shops and restaurants that we told you about. But it definitely doesn't have the charm of the smaller hotels.
Still reviewers consistently like this hotel which probably has something to do with its location on the park and the killer views it offers. However, quite a few complained of extremely small bathrooms and bland guest room furniture, furthering our perception that it's more of a big-box hotel.
As for what's onsite, there's a Soma Centre spa, the Park Terrace restaurant and a landmark bar, Berties. You could even pop into the Connoisseur Casino which is located in the hotel but is not an official part of the hotel. The place is open from 12pm to 6am everyday.
Right now, the hotel is offering a "Spring 3 for 2 Escape" which is three nights for the price of two. A standard room (single occupancy only) starts at £170, a deluxe room with park view at £200, and the Park Suite at £350. The deal includes full English breakfast and VAT which is a pretty decent deal. It's available from now through April 30, May 2-5, and May 23-26.
On our recent sojourn to London, we hit up the Baglioni Hotel in Hyde Park. While we lurved our hotel, we noticed there were a few other options in the 'hood. And considering that we dug the Kensington/High Street shopping and attractions, we'd be keen to stay in the area again.
The Milestone Hotel looks similar to the Baglioni on the outside and isn't that much different on the inside in terms of offerings and services.
Both are located inside of old Victorian-era buildings across from Hyde Park (about 2 small blocks away from each other) and both are members of the Leading Small Hotels of the World group. The Milestone, however, got the top pick for London on Travel and Leisure's Top 500 list as well as Conde Naste's Gold List for 2008.
Both hotels have eccentric furnishings and decor and at the Milestone Hotel, no two rooms are alike. The Milestone's Cheneston restaurant is probably superior to the Baglioni's Brunello lobby restaurant but the Baglioni was open late night until 2am obliging our orders for more red wine. Not sure if the Milestone will do that.
The easyHotel South Kensington (damn you, annoying lower-cased brand names) is not close to the shops we adore at Kensington and Hight Street.
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by juliana
