The hotel is conveniently located in a quiet cul-d...

The hotel is conveniently located in a quiet cul-de-sac, 5 minutes walk from Kensington High Street tube. Inside there are various restaurant options including a pub with international food and good beer, an Asian and smaller cafes. I had a curry and a beer in the pub, that was average. The buffet breakfast is good, for GBP 13.75 (when not included in the room rate).

The hotel is kept clean, the service is good and staff were friendly in all interactions. I was positively surprised by a digital innovation, found as I came in the room: the hotel lends you a quality mobile phone with a good battery life. It is free to use during the guest's stay. If you lose it you have to pay GBP 170. The Handy can be taken around London, you can browse the internet, use Google Maps, make local and international phone calls for free. It is configured so you can easily find interesting information about things happening in London, museums, walks, shops and restaurants for example.

I got the cheapest room with a double bed, I won't comment about the other higher-standard room types which were offered for 60GBP upgrade including some deal for drink or food, which I did not want at check-in. My room was clean but I noticed a mold-like smell everytime I came in the room, but after 6 minutes the nose started to get over the impact and started somehow to get used to it. The heating worked well when required. The shower was ok and the water abundant, but if the water flows too fast this creates a vacuum effect which pulls the curtain towards you so it sticks to you when standing up. The bedsheets, duvet cover and pillow covers were white clean. One of the mattrasses was ok but the other seemed to have a slightly lower height in the head than in the foot. The pillows were firm and adequate.

The sliding window must not be opened for safety reasons, and despite being shut it produced a wistling sound due to the wind passing between the fixed and sliding part. The reception sent an engineer to check the window up when I went out but I suppose nothing could be done as the sound was heard afterwards. It was not a noise and temperature isolated double-glazed window, but a single sheet of glass on an aluminium frame, a standard that seems prevalent in many London hotels and let some of the buzz outside reach inside the room. Despite that, there was no need to have the heating turned-on, outside the temperature was 8 Celsius. The black-out curtain was kept shut during the night to stop the light and cold coming in.

Therefore all things considered it gets a 4 star for the relative positive experience and service received.