4 of us girlfriends spent 3 nights here on a long weekend away. Dupont Circle is a terrific and central location, and I would highly recommend staying in this area. We were able to find a deal for $135/night, which is great for this type of advertised hotel (trendy, renovated, central), granted we stayed in February. When we got to the hotel we asked if there were any available upgrades, and unfortunately the only upgrade was for a slightly bigger room and access to the "penthouse" lounge with free nibbles, drinks (including beer, soda, coffee), and wine/liquor/champagne at night after 5:30. I was charged an extra 100/night for access to the club floor, and this was such a scam.... totally not worth it!!! All in all, was the room and experience worth 235 a night? Not a chance in heaven!! I'll explain why next....
The room was a decent size, actually quite spacious which was great considering we had 4 people. The bathroom was, as I've read before, really small and inconvenient. Thank god we are all close friends, because the "door" to the toilet is a thin layer of frosted glass. When you use the shower, everything (including the toilet and towel rack) get soaked. Really poor design. The water never gets beyond luke warm either. I couldn't wait to get home and take a nice, refreshing and hot shower. Really unsatisfying. We also had to call down to service 4 times over the course of the evening to request more towels and robes - I'm not sure why it took them so long. We were late to our reservation because they hadn't accommodated us the first time we asked. On reflection, it was probably because the elevators were slower than molasses!
So, the penthouse. First of all, the department of health needs to evaluate the food they are serving as little nibbles... that place is a food poisoning disaster waiting to happen. They left fish, including sardines, tuna, another white fish and shrimp out in a hot room, without refrigeration and in inappropriate conditions all afternoon and/or night. Someone is going to get so sick from eating that food - no one should be leaving that type of food sitting out in a hot room for hours. Staff rarely check and/or replaced the food - it literally just sat there for ages. I was horrified at this. There was also rarely enough food out, so if you came at the wrong time, you felt duped. The two redeeming factors were the fact that they had 4 different white and 4 different red wine, including 4 types of top shelf liquor and moet champagne (but only one bottle) out at night. The space also provided a great and quiet lounge for the 4 of us to catch up and laugh - very comfortable and classy. All in all, definitely not worth the 100 extra we paid. I'll never do that again....
If the price is right, and you don't mind the severe lack of privacy in the bathroom, I would recommend staying here, otherwise, it won't live up to your expectations.
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