I just had a 2 night stays here. Overall, this is a great hotel for the location, more upscale and updated than the Westin and Sheraton in Pasadena. There are a few service kinks they need to work through.

First of all, the hotel definitely play with the SNA inventory availability, as they were still selling both the suite and executive room, but SNA would not clear by the computer. Ultimately, I ended up in a Classic room on the 5th floor, even after asking about suite upgrade at check-in.

Valet was efficient and friendly, and they offered to take bags up for me. In addition to calling for your car, you can text your ticket number to retrieve your vehicle, and it generally took about 5-10 minutes, which was not bad. There is an offer where they would waive the valet parking for 1 night if you spend over $75 at the hotel restaurant or bar for lunch or dinner.

The room, as everyone had described above, was great. There were power and USB-A plugs on each side of the bed. Additionally, there is a power, USB-A, and USB-C plugs across from the small working desk. There is 1 complimentary bottle water in the room each night.

(Malin+Goetz) amenities were in the room for the first night, including a double sized shower gel. Housekeeping is available upon request. However, even with the DND sign on the door, they were pounding the door at 2pm without announcing themselves, anxious to clean the room. Also, the replacement bath amenities were of random brands. I informed the front desk about the door pounding, and at first they were somewhat apologetic, and then rationalized it because they needed to clean the room.

I chose breakfast in lieu of welcome amenity points. The breakfast was continental breakfast combo or a $23.44 credit, and the credit covers the associated taxes, mandatory tips, and CA tourism fees ($0.03). Bear in mind that outside of continental breakfast combo, everything is a la carte, which includes a $6 coffee or juice. I had the ricotta pancake the first day, and avocado toast with soft scrambled eggs the second day. The service was efficient, and the food was pretty good. There is a complimentary coffee station in the lobby as well.





Due to a last minute plan change, I had dinner at the hotel restaurant on my second night. I did confirm that the bar has a different menu than the restaurant, and it does not offer the restaurant menu. Restaurant menu is here: https://www.melangearcadia.com/our-menus
The pricing is similar to a casual fine dining restaurant. The server is friendly, but since she is working by herself along with a food runner/busser, her attention span at each table is short. However, she is engaging when she is at the table. This is how I learn that one of the targeted customer group is racehorse owners, who normally would stay at the Langham but now switching to Le Meridien, which is significantly closer.




I had the crispy quail, the half duck and pea shoots. Both were delicious, although the plating was designed more for family style/sharing than for individual plating. For dessert, I had the macadamia nut tart, and I added the ube ice cream.





Wine selection was decent and well-priced for the area.

Another disappointing aspect was that the hotel only credited the room rates for points, and not for food and beverage spend. While it only took a phone call to Marriott customer service to resolve the issue, this should not be a required step for the guest.

Overall, despite of its few shortcomings, I would stay here again.

The reverse side of the menu is in Simplified Chinese, not Kanji (which is a whole different writing system). However, I could be wrong, but I seriously doubt any Chinese customer could order in Mandarin Chinese, since it appears that none of the servers can speak Chinese.