The Chace Hotel, Coventry

On first view of the outside of this hotel, you are met with a wonderous and impressive victorian architectural sight, which gives such a welcoming feel, unusual from other hotels around this area. The well kept gardens which surround this hotel also heightens your expectations.


*****The Hotel: Outside*****

The first thing which catches your eye is the beautiful oak panelling of the main lounge bar area, which ...
...small reception tucked away nearer the back, which is both good and bad. It is not easily seen at first sight which can both be annoying and uninviting, especially to business guests, yet I do feel that it is put there to keep with the atmosphere of the entrance hall, and it actually works!

The bar area itself is extremely pleasant and welcoming. The seating is so comfortable that you could literally fall asleep in them, especially ... more

On first view of the outside of this hotel, you are met with a wonderous and impressive victorian architectural sight, which gives such a welcoming feel, unusual from other hotels around this area. The well kept gardens which surround this hotel also heightens your expectations.

*****The Hotel: Outside*****

The first thing which catches your eye is the beautiful oak panelling of the main lounge bar area, which is situated to the left of the main entrance and provides a relaxing atmosphere whilst awaiting your room to be ready, (or simply for relaxing means).

*****Entrance and Lounge Bar*****

There is a small reception tucked away nearer the back, which is both good and bad. It is not easily seen at first sight which can both be annoying and uninviting, especially to business guests, yet I do feel that it is put there to keep with the atmosphere of the entrance hall, and it actually works!

The bar area itself is extremely pleasant and welcoming. The seating is so comfortable that you could literally fall asleep in them, especially if the large fireplace is lit up. It is quite offputting, though, that the huge staircase to the more selective rooms is positioned very close by, especially if you are not as lucky to be in them! Yet, this is a small price to pay for such a lovely lounge bar experience (except, there was a slightly weird smell to it, a mixture of cigarette odour and stale odour - quite offputting actually, though I got used to it)

With regards to price, I wouldn't say that they are overly expensive, yet they are not local pub cheap either. The range they had were brilliant and the service at the bar was not too bad, yet at busy periods it became less of a good service and more of a disaterous waiting period, which in that case, we simply left and went elsewhere.

*****The Resturant*****

The resturant area was quite pleasent and well set out with a welcoming feel to it. The menu was extremely ranged and most seemed quite nice, although obviously I can not comment on all the dishes as even I couldn't eat that many!
The breakfasts, though, were not as fully ranged as what I expected. They do offer a range of meals, yet the meals themselves were slightly substantial. For example, the continental breakfast consisted of cartons of yoghurt; mini boxes of cereal; tinned fruit and tiny pastries, with juice and tea or coffee.

The service was nothing to complain about, yet it did take quite a while to actually be served your courses, which is a negative especially for those on a busy, timed day. As with the bar area, prices were neither overly expensive, yet they were not by any means cheap, and were perhaps a little pricey for what you actually ate.

*****Bedrooms*****

This hotel offers a large range of bedrooms, yet in my opinion, this area of the hotel was perhaps the most poor of the whole experience.

Upon entering the room, I was astounded by the size. It was huge! Yet, this was perhaps the only thing which really seemed a plus.

Within the ground floor room which we stayed, there was two beds, a double and a single (a family room, yet there are also many other single and double rooms alone, which I can not comment on). The beds were well made, yet the sheets did not appear very clean and had numerous pen ink stains over them.

One thing which really put me off is the unwashed cups and slightly unclean sides. Not a welcoming feel to it at all.

The room as a whole was anything but invoting. It had minimal natural light and felt extremely hot and stuffy, which meant a terrible night sleep as we could not work out how to change the heating to the room. Another aspect which did not help this case is that our window did not open properly, so we were not even able to have any fresh air. This soon became sickly and all I wanted to do was get out of the room as soon as I could.

The room was also extremely plain compared to the rest of the hotel, and I just had that feeling of being boxed in - not a pleasant feel at al, especially after the brilliant photos on their website before booking up - completely misleading!

Another important factor to note is the walls. I am not talking about the shabby paintwork (although this did not help with the terrible feel to it either), yet I am talking of the paper-thin width of the walls, allowing every little noise to emit through and keep you awake all night, especially if there is a rowdy crowd next door. You will not wake up feeling refreshed, I will tell you that now!

*****En Suite Bathroom*****

After seeing the room, I was not expecting anything special with the bathroom at all, and I was not surprised in the slightest.

Whilst it was clean enough, it did not have that luxury and relaxing feel which you might expect. The walls were once again shabby, leaving a dirty feel to it. The towels were nice and clean, though, yet were nothing special. One average aspect was that it did feature hot running water - a small mercy I guess!

*****Bedroom Service*****

Another aspect which, in my opinion, needs some practise. I don't usually order any food for the room, yet after an only half-decent meal in the resturant I decided to try room service, yet I soon found out that they did not serve the rooms until gone 8pm due to the resturant being busy!
The service came with no smile and a rather bored tone and approximatly a hour after they said it would arrive, as I was thrust my dinner which cost over the top (for example a fruit salad was £4 and it was tiny). The meal tasted cold and unappertising and slightly like card board if I was to describe it right. I was also only given one set of cutlery consisting of a half-clean knife and a half-clean fork, which meant not only did I have to wash them before hand, I also had to wash them again before I could even attempt my desert!

*****Costs*****

Rooms start from £45 per night and can range over £100 per night. Personally, paying even the lowest possible is too much in my opinion. I would rather have gone somewhere else and paid slightly more to have enabled me a good night sleep.

*****Extra Information*****

Hotel Tel No: +44 (0)870 609 6130
66 bedrooms (Number Of Family Bedrooms: 23 rooms
Number Of Non-smoking Bedrooms: 34 rooms)
Family bedrooms are available at the hotel
London's Restaurant and Bar
Oak panelled lounge
Lounge with BT Openzone
Number of meeting rooms: 5
Meeting room capacity: 80
Parking Spaces: 100
Nearest Rail Link: Conventry 3.5m
Nearest Airport: Coventry 1m

*****Overall*****

I am not a fussy person, and do not like to complain, (which is perhaps a downside sometimes) though I do feel that the whole bedroom aspect is enough to send anyone insane and especially enough to never return to the hotel.

Staff were generally welcoming, yet the room service certainly did not fit into this description one bit.

For what you pay for this hotel, I would have expected a much higher standard. It goes to disprove the saying 'you get what you pay for' completely untrue and I certainly did not get what I paid for!
 

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