I stayed here the weekend I got married in Houston, the first night alone, the second night with my husband. I should preface this by saying that we did not have our wedding at the Houstonian, but we did have a large guest block reserved there. I made a point to tell the staff that I was staying there for my wedding night and inquired about possible upgrades, at which point they offered an upgrade to "concierge level." However, the room was still just a standard guest room. On the night of my wedding, the hotel did absolutely nothing extra to enhance the experience -- I know of several other hotels in the area that upgrade guests to suites for their wedding night, have chilled champagne, strawberries, or flowers waiting in the room. The Houstonian did nothing - it was just another night as far as they were concerned. Additionally, while I know the Houstonian can't control the behavior of other hotel guests, I was incredibly turned off by the behavior of some of the other clients staying there. At 4pm the day of my wedding, I was getting make-up done in my mother's suite, with my maid-of-honor and mother. We were playing music in the living room - fairly mellow selections such as Neko Case, Lucinda Williams, and the new Dixie Chicks. The music was at a medium level - you could barely hear it in the adjoining bedroom and it was about the level of a television program. The guests in the room next door banged on the wall and yelled through the wall to "turn it down!!" This is behavior I would expect (but have not seen) at maybe a Days Inn -- not at a supposedly 5-star resort. These neighbors then sent their 11- year old daughters over 10 minutes later to ask us to turn the music down because "they were trying to sleep" (they meaning the really ill-behaved parents??). We turned the music down 2 levels on the dial. However, at 4pm in the afternoon, apparently these people would only be happy with absolute silence because THEN they called security. I was completely fed up at that point and had the security in-house officer stay at the open front door and asked him if he could even hear the music. He seemed incredulous and couldn't believe that that was the volume level being complained about -- he could barely hear it. However, he did at least say that he would talk to the next door neighbors about their attitude problem. Yes, we were playing music, but it was at 4pm on a Saturday afternoon, and it wasn't like we were blasting gangster rap. I know the guest's response wasn't the Houstonian's fault, but it did make me question the overall "quality" of the hotel anyways, and left a bad taste in my mouth.
The lobby and grounds of the hotel are beautiful, and the fitness center is the best I've ever seen anywhere. However, I felt like the guest rooms (unless you are in a suite) were kind of dark and small, and I felt like the staff was fairly inattentive. If you are looking for a pampering experience, I would look elsewhere.
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