Here is a review of the W in Austin that I just posted on Yelp. I also uploaded a few pictures on Yelp.
"I travel to Austin pretty often because of my Texas Longhorns Football season tickets and because it's my second favorite city in the world (after NYC). I've been anticipating the opening of the W for quite some time, and my one night stay didn't disappoint. I want to make this my second home...
I've turned into a complete hotel snob after staying in a hotel for over 200 nights just last year alone, so I've had a wide range of experiences with Starwood properties. I would rank the W in Austin near the top (The Joule in Dallas is still my favorite, and I don't think anything will ever top that).
It doesn't surprise me that a few of the early reviewers had bad experiences dealing with the employees or with the overall hotel operation. One of the managers admitted it was a bit of a disaster the first few weeks since they were still trying to work out all the kinks.
But after about a month of being open, it seems like everything is running very smoothly. The employees were very friendly and eager to assist with my needs, and I didn't have any issues.
Let's start with the positives:
1. Atmosphere: I love the modern/hip/luxurious design of the hotel.
2. Starwood Preferred Guest benefits: When it comes to upgrades and other SPG benefits, Starwood properties are hit or miss. Luckily this hotel goes out of its way to treat Platinum members with respect. They gave me a free upgrade to one of the Cool Corner Suites, and I was pretty blown away. The hotel rate for a corner suite is worth about twice what I paid for...
3. The rooms: The rooms are amazing with a great level of comfort and a great view of the city. The bathrooms are nice and clean, and as always, they include the awesome Bliss products that I love to steal. They also have HD TVs in every room where every channel is in HD. Heck, the Beverly Hilton didn't even have this feature.
*Check out the pictures I uploaded.
Negatives:
1. The price - The lowest price that I've seen is about $279, and during football season and other busy weekends, the rate shoots up to at least $454 a night. The $279 rate is ok with me, but I would never pay close to $500 per night at this hotel.
Of course you can use SPG points, but it will cost you at least 12,000 points on most nights, and 16,000 on the busy weekends. That's crazy...
I'm also disappointed that they don't offer the cash and points option as much as they should. It would normally be just 4800 points + $90, but every random weekend that I checked didn't even offer this option.
I still need to try out the restaurants, bars, and the pool. If the pool is similar to the Wet pool at the W in Dallas, then I'll be highly satisfied. I'll update this review once I have a chance to check out these other features.
Overall, I would recommend this hotel to anyone that is looking for an amazing place to crash in Austin. Like I said earlier, this is going to be my 1st choice whenever I make it down to Austin."