I just returned from a 3-night stay at this hotel. It is good and could be great, but will probably never live up to its potential, because some of the people who work there have obviously never stayed in a place like this and have no concept of professional service. I'll look elsewhere in the future.
The place must be only about 5 years old, if that, and is very modern and high tech; it gives you the impression that you have stepped 5 years into the future. Rooms are quite spacious and very clean. The hotel is located in a brand new mixed use office/residence area, very walkable. A free breakfast is served every morning, supposedly at 6:30 am, though that is wishful thinking. The beds are very comfortable, and there is plenty of hot water in the walk-in shower.
Sadly, the owners succumb to the modern corporate tendency to express themselves in twee phrases--for instance, the gym is called "Motion." A plaque on your bathroom mirror advises the guest to "sip responsibly" from the tap--I'm not kidding--and lets you know that the floor tiles are made from recycled fish nets. A gentle self-advertisement follows, describing the places green credentials, but you can't read it! It is dark green with very faint and rather small white lettering. I'm all for sustainability, but it seems that they simultaneously wished to announce and yet obscure their climate consciousness.
There is a nook in the lobby, as expected in many hotels, even of lesser quality than this, selling various snacks--but no sundries, such as deodorant, aspirin, and the like. That was a strange omission.
There is no parking lot. You can park in a garage perhaps a quarter-mile up the street in an apartment building, or use Element's valet parking. They give you a link to an app that lets you schedule auto pickup in advance and also lets you tip an attendant online.
The valet parking staff is absolutely the best thing about the whole experience. I have hardly seen such an energetic, customer-oriented group anywhere, and if you just sat outside at the valet parking station and watched them in action your whole stay, you would be singing the hotel's praises.
But there are not nearly enough of them. On my last night there, I had to sit in my car for *20 minutes* waiting for someone to show up, and there was no "big event" at the hotel or anything like that.
The dining room experience is so poor as to be laughable. First, in a place like this, though they have plenty of cold items, including fruit, yogurt, granola, pastries, and the like, they have only *one* hot item in the *whole* place. ONE. It is a large casserole dish of scrambled eggs. Not only do they feature just one hot item, they actually ADVERTISE this sorry state of affairs. I thought they were joking. Between that and their patronizing "sip responsibly" admonition, I half expected them to post that rooms were limited to one toilet flush per day and that instead of towels, bathrooms would be equipped with palm fronds.
And that's not the worst of it. They actually do have a rotating menu of breakfast tacos, serving a different one each day, but there is no way for you to FIND THAT OUT, except by happenstance. There is no SIGN, except for a very small sign around the corner from most of the room, where a kitchen attendant waits on the other side of a window to take your order. I kept sitting in the dining room wondering why, one after another, adults were standing in that nook as though they were children placed in time out, until I finally walked over to investigate and discovered the sign and the attendant. As with their conservation credentials, they seem to want to simultaneously make it available and yet conceal it from you, so that it would be possible, in principle, to spend your whole stay there never suspecting that you could go up and ask for a breakfast taco, because you can't SEE the window. Such obtuseness is absolutely beyond belief.
There is also the matter of the muzak. I don't want to feel like I'm in a country-western honky tonk, but neither do I want to feel as though I am in a dive bar in the inner city with a lot of shouting and caterwauling being piped in. I want something more polite and neutral. I went to the front desk manager and asked him about it, and he took me to a panel and showed me that their only choices are whatever is being played on one of three radio stations, each represented by a control button on the wall. In any case, what was being played didn't sound very professional.
Finally, the very worst part of the experience is the actual service in the dining room. On my first morning there, I didn't go down until perhaps 8:00 or so, but on my last two mornings, I was there at 6:25, poured myself a cup of coffee, sat at a table, and quietly waited for them to open at 6:30, as advertised. On December 26, the lights were still out at 6:35, and the bananas weren't set out until 6 :40, and they were all green. On December 27, it was even later. On that morning, a tall black man, evidently the dining room supervisor, sauntered in with a lackadaisical air, made a few half-hearted swipes at setting out food items, and mostly stood there just looking at his phone. He actually looked in my direction with an apparent attitude of daring me to make him take any of this seriously. The continuing lateness of the opening and his open air of casual defiance were quite simply offensive.
It's really too bad, because the attractiveness and comfort of the physical plant and furnishings make it seem like the kind of place you would really want to stay. And if a hotel stay consisted of nothing but watching the energy and enthusiasm of valet parking lot attendants, even though understaffed, this place would win awards. But there were too many annoying lapses to allow me to take this place seriously, and I won't be back.
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