We had very low expectations prior to arriving to this hotel (mostly based on the unflattering reviews on TripAdvisor), but still, after staying at the hotel for 2 nights in early August 2010 - we were VERY disappointed.

Where do I begin?
Well, the hotel IS, in fact, very close to Westlake, but this is, alas, one of the only good things about it. All you have to do is cross the street and Westlake is there. Having said that, since taxis are dead cheap in Hangzhou, there's no reason to stay so close to the lake. A 5-minute taxi ride from the lake and you can stay at a REAL luxury hotel.

The check-in process was easy. Since we are A|Club members, we got the upgraded from a superior room to a luxury room on the executive 5th floor (mind you, I emailed the hotel several weeks prior to our trip to make sure we get the upgrade). The upgrade did not include the so-called "club benefits" (which were nonexistent to begin with), but our room did include a free usage of a laptop, which was conveniently located in the room.

The elevators in this 6-floor hotel are SO 1980's!!! They're small, old fashioned and sort of smelly.

The room itself is SUPER basic. It's as basic as you'd expect a room in a 3-star hotel, not a luxury hotel. The photos in the hotel's homepage are truly misleading. Here's a photo I found online, which does the room more justice than the official photos:http://static.elong.com/images/hotel...0_8_1067_9.jpg

The bathroom is tiny, and I mean TINY (apx. 3x2.5 meters) with no shower (on an executive floor!).
Since we were on the executive floor, we did get L'occitane bathroom amenities (which are our favorites), but the bathroom itself was truly poor.
The beds were ok - soft in a nice way (which was a nice change to most of China's HARD beds).

Our room on the 5th floor was directly beneath the Chinese restaurant on the 6th floor and the sound isolation was non-existent. We heard constant steps, chairs and tables moving, which eventually stopped around 11PM, but started again early in the morning.

Notice the extreme proximity of the hotel to the buildings nearby. You get to choose if you want your room to turn to the noisy street, or, if you prefer, your window can be 2 meters (literally!) from the neighbours kitchen window in the adjacent building.

The first night we had an a la carte dinner at the "French" restaurant. Needless to say, we were all alone in there. The food was really really REALLY bad. Again, not even 3* standard. Luckily, we have an AdvantagePlus card, that entitles us to a 50% discount on food. Still, the food was not worth the price we paid (a mare 15 US$ after discount).

The next morning, we had a buffet breakfast, which was truly unimaginative and not that tasty. Although it was already nearly 40 degrees outside, they did not turn the a/c in the restaurant to the max, thus we were sweating throughout breakfast. Naturally, we reported this to the duty manager, who promised this would be fixed by tomorrow. Needless to say - this did not happen.

Westlake itself was very nice - we took a long walk in the afternoon and enjoyed it a lot (40 degrees + 85% humidity - ouch!).
After a quick shower, we wanted to check out the gym and the pool. What a joke! The pool is no larger than a big bath (underground, no windows, no fresh air, no chlorine in the water!) and the gym was dated and abandoned.

We sat in the lounge and had a coffee and cake (which cost more than the dinner we had the previous evening - go figure...).
In the evening, we had a buffet dinner, which was the worst buffet dinner we had in China. There was very limited meats and sea fruits to choose from, the a/c still did not work and the deserts were all stale.

The staff members are mostly very nice (and can even communicate in very basic English), but this is simply not enough.

The hilarious part was, that during our trip, we only stayed in Accor hotels (Sofitels and Pullmans) and somehow, this turned out to be the most expensive hotel we actually paid for (135$ per night for 2 people) and the worst hotel, at the same time.

I think Sofitel MUST re-brand this hotel and downgrade it to either Mercure or Ibis, since calling it "Sofitel" is an insult to the Sofitel brand.
I can understand that this hotel is mainly targeted for Chinese tourists, who can be fooled into believing this is how luxury looks like. For Westerners, however, and excuse my arrogance, this is a clear case of "Faulty Towers".

"A Sofitel it ain't" is my summary of this hotel. Stay away from this hotel, since it has a potential of ruining your stay in beautiful Hangzhou.
Accor - PLEASE re-brand this hotel and downgrade it accordingly. This hotel literally casts a dark shadow on the entire Sofitel brand name.