St Martins Lane

Este es un hotel de diseño de arriba a abajo. En la puerta ni siquiera pone que es un hotel, de hecho mas bien parece un Club. El hall tampoco parece la recepción de un hotel, por cierto, el restaurante con cocina fusión Thai-Cuba es una pasada.

Los ascensores tiene musica chill-out y estan ilumninados unicamente por la luz de unas pantallas planas que muestran videos relajantes. Los pasillos estan muy bien acondicionados para aislar el ruido, pero lo mejor son las habitaciones.

Me quedè en la 634 en la última planta.

La habitación es un gran cubo blanco en el que una de las paredes es toda de cristal y da al exterior. Hay varias luces que se pueden atenuar para crear diferentes ambientes. La mesa es de marmol artificial y se ilumina junto con las luces relajantes de la cama, en las que se puede cambiar la gama de colores.

En definitiva, las habitaciones estan llenas de detalles, el mejor, la base JBL para escuchar musica con tu Ipod.

El único inconveniente fue la conexión a internet, que primero no funcionaba y luego era muy lenta. A pesar de esto, el personal del hotel se volcó para ayudarme y al final ni siquiera me cobraron el servicio de internet.

Un hotel muy recomendable.

My friend and I were heading to London to see "Wicked" and my travel Agent pal, who owed me a favour, kindly booked us into St Martins Lane Hotel (Courtesy of his company) for the night.

On first entering the hotel you cannot help but notice the very unusual seats and chairs scattered around the reception area. Although most look like they are for visual effect rather than comfort they certainly fit the overall design of the hotel and provide a good talking point.

The hotel staff were great from start to finish. Very pleasant check-in staff and porters. We were immediately given the key to our room and our bags followed close behind.

We had a lovely twin room with pure white furnishings and coloured mood lights. The room was not exactly spacious but large enough for our short stay and the bathroom was a very good size. The room had a safe and mini-bar, flat screen tv and ipod speakers. We even had a choice of umbrellas hanging in the wardrobe. There was a hairdryer but, as with most hotels, this was pretty useless so I was glad I had brought my own.

The bathroom had lots of large bath towels and the ones we used early in the evening were replaced later that night while we were out.

The hotel does not have a bar that is open during the day. We wanted to order a cocktail at 4pm and had to sit in the restaurant to drink it.

When we came back from the theatre we headed into the "Light Bar" for a few drinks. This proved to be a very costly experience as 2 Gin and Tonics was approx £28 !!! We didn't know London that well or we would have set off to another bar.

When we got back to our room someone had lit a scented candle in the bathroom - lovely touch, and turned down the beds.

During the weekend the hotel will serve breakfast until noon which I thought was a great benefit to anyone wanting a relaxing morning.

We headed for breakfast at 10.30am as we wanted to squeeze in some shopping before going home. The breakfast was really good although I'm glad it was included in our stay as a cooked breakfast was approx £27 per person.

Our breakfast waiter was superb. I didn't catch his name but what a lovely guy!

Check-out was effortless and the hotel staff took care of our bags while we wandered off to Covent Garden (5 mins walk). When we came back the hotel staff arranged for a taxi to take us to the airport.

All-in-all we had a lovely time. I am very glad I was not paying the bill at the end of our stay as it was a very expensive hotel but as it was complimentary I was extremely happy!

I have stayed here a couple of times on business. The rooms are phenomenally small and some do have terrible 1980's portable TVs (somewhat contradictory to the rest of the room's appearance). However, the desk staff are alway wonderfully pleasant. Booking through my corporate travel agent the rates have been quite good (cheaper than the over-priced Hilton Trafalgar) and the location is excellent. Stay away from the mini bar - 3 pounds for M&Ms and don't expect to be able to make a cup of tea in your room as there are no facilities (my biggest annoyance). The rooms and very clean and beds are very comfortable