This hotel is full of weird and often clever (& wacky?) interior design. I loved the high ceilings and typical guest room. My wife and I stayed for 3 nights in a standard King. It was comfortable & quiet.
The guest room:
As an architect who travels and enjoys looking at design, I can see where they are busting up the standard solutions, like deleting drawers and doors, organizing all of the coffee maker wardrobe stuff into open shelves across from the vanity, and getting daylight into the wonderful walk-in shower (my favorite feature). The platform bed was excellent.
Lighting design is mostly good (one of my pet peeves of hotel rooms); the wardrobe ceiling wash is terrific. It is interesting how they feature a huge HD 42" LCD screen on a dark brown wall opposite the bed, almost like a shrine. The TV was a good distraction from our dull glarey view of a vast parking garage. Unfortunately the touted TV connection to your laptop to look at DVD's was not working. The desk said the hotel needed Phillips to come fix them all.
Under the LCD screen is a handy built-in 8' long padded bench: great spot to array your open suitcases. However, I do wish there was a comfortable chair (other than the desk chair).
Overall we like the room and thought it was much better than any corporate chain in this price range. They copied from the Standard Hotel and other modern boutiques like Tower 23 in San Diego; (these are more $$$ for a stay).
Other comments:
Free parking in the garage across the street. Easy access to freeway once you figure it out, but about 20-25 min to downtown Austin.
Big shopping complex right next door, with many upper end restaurants, Starbucks, all kinds of shops: Borders, Apple, Sony, Macy's, Neiman Marcus.
Lobby was interesting and had fun things like a pool table, a high tech lounge and bar, convenience food, lots of LCD screens, and very often - LOUD hip techno music. It was so loud that the front desk had a hard time hearing me. Some might say the lobby was busy, garish and a little cheap looking. It is not exactly cozy. But I laud their experiment and just think it needs to be edited down so not quite as much going on visually.
The rear terrace might have had some potential for atmosphere if the minature pool was not fenced in like a pennitentary, w/ lighting to match. I wish they could lose all the "yard" lights.
Lobby staff we met were all very friendly young people, eager to help.
Overall I say this is lots of fun as a place to lay your head. I just wish it were located downtown in a more "real" neighborhood. As a tourist from Seattle, I found it too far from what makes Austin unique. We have all the same stores and restaurants here at home, so were not very into the mall scene next to Aloft. I'd rather stay on S Congress St.
With about 30 of these around the country, I'd be up for trying them in other locations due to the design.
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