Italian_Kayaker

Just received a "Pre-Arrival Update", stating:

"Property Renovations. ... Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise will be undergoing renovations on the property grounds ... until Summer 2024 ... the construction noise will be loud and may have an impact on your stay." [italics added]

Is the construction noise indeed that bad? Or are they just trying to pre-empt complaints?

CanadaDH

I wouldn't worry about it. I haven't been there since last summer, and the construction didn't bother me then. They have been giving that warning since they started work on the new Thermal Wellness Centre. My next visit isn't for another few weeks, so I don't have any recent experience. But, I just skimmed throught the most recent 3 pages of CLL reviews on TripAdvisor, and only one review that I saw even mentioned the construction, and it was from January. It said this...

That basically mirrors my experience in the summer. You know there is work going on, because you can see it in front of the hotel on the northwest side of the building. But, we never really heard anything while inside.

The other possible construction noise is they are renovating rooms in the hotel. I suppose if you're staying in a room near another room being renovated, you'd hear something. Starting September 2023 and running to spring 2024, they're renovating all remaining main building rooms. But my understanding is that the hotel was taking rooms in close proximity to other rooms being renovated out of service.

Scifience

I had a really disappointing one-night stay here earlier this month, booked on an AMEX FHR rate at nearly $1,000 CAD:

• For several days prior to my stay, the Accor app was showing I had been upgraded from a Lakeview King to a 2BR Lakeview Suite — which I was thrilled with. This disappeared an hour or so before check-in, and at the front desk I was told no upgrades at all were available despite this suite still showing as available for the night online. While obviously upgrades are not guaranteed, this already left a bad taste in my mouth.
• When I got to the room, there was no welcome amenity (an FHR benefit) — a further indication the room may have been swapped at the last minute, since both the Banff Springs and Jasper Park Lodge had amenities waiting on arrival. Delivery was attempted three hours later, while we were out with no privacy sign, but only a note was left and we had to call for re-delivery. The amenity itself was nice — cheese, grapes, and a ~$20 bottle of wine.
• The room itself was very worn. The views were great, as expected, but the room was clearly un-renovated and the bathtub had a giant peeling hole in the enamel, the chair was stained rather badly, and the makeup mirror in the bathroom didn't open properly and was clearly dirty/rusted.
• We had dinner reservations at Walliser Stube. The food was excellent, but we experienced multiple basic service fails: our server completely ignored us for a solid 10m after being seated, we were incorrectly brought another table's mains when we hadn't even gotten our cocktails yet, and our server mixed up my order with my partner's when placing silverware.

I could have overlooked a lot of this at a different price point, but for $1,000 a night and $100+ per person for dinner, this was a really disappointing experience. I complained and ultimately got 10% off the total bill at checkout, but still left feeling frustrated — especially compared to the excellent experiences I had at sister properties in Banff and Jasper on the same trip.


The offending bathtub

The welcome amenity — quite solid, but with bungled delivery

Eagle_traveler

Wow, can't believe they gave you a room with a tub like that! They should definitely put that room out of order until it gets renovated.

grandchampion

I had a different experience than Scifience as I was at FCLL for a 5-night stay last week with my wife and our two sons (6 and 8). Bottom line: this is a wonderful hotel in a spectacularly beautiful setting, with great service and tons of things for the whole family to do.

A few highlights of the stay:

• I had booked a 1-bedroom suite, and was thrilled to see in the Accor app that we were upgraded to a two bedroom lake view suite. The room we had (359) was wonderful, with both bedrooms and the parlor room with full views of the lake. The suite was comfortable and well-appointed; CanadaDH left a review of this room above, and I don't have much to add to that. The hotel was full while we were there - there was a physics conference, and many of the rooms were blocked as they are under construction. Perhaps the conference filled up the smaller rooms and suites as there weren't many families during our stay, and we were the grateful beneficiaries of the two-bedroom upgrade. Shortly after we got into the room we received an amenity of a bottle of red wine and a 'candy tower' for the kids.
• Service across the board was warm and delightful - from the bellmen to concierge to restaurant staff to housekeeping to activities staff. Everyone was very friendly and kind, engaging with my children, and committed to ensuring that we had a great stay. We had especially good service at breakfast each day in Louiza, at dinner at Walliser Stube, and with the activities staff during a Bavarian curling (!) lesson and game.
• We ate at a number of the dining outlets - Louiza daily for breakfast, Walliser Stube for dinner, and afternoon tea at the Lakeview Lounger. Service and food was uniformly high-quality, and my family and I especially enjoyed the dinner at WS - it's a cozy, wood-paneled room with a fireplace, great fondue, and smart wines. (NB: if you book a suite, breakfast for all registered guests and parking is included. With the four of us for five days, this added up to be a great value.)
• We took advantage of a number of activities and amenities at the hotel. Favorites included:
  • A Bavarian curling class (think bocce on ice) which was fun for grown-ups and kids. Out host, Harrison, provided a good mix of instruction and humor.
  • The mixology class at Fairview Lounge was also a hit. I benefitted from being the only participant, and had a private lesson with the bartender, who led us through crafting the signature drinks of the Banff, Lake Louise, and Jasper Fairmonts. Normally, you're given half of each drink; but given that I was the only participant, and you can't make half a drink... you could do the math. The mixologist shared not only the recipes, but also tips about ingredients and techniques - like when a drink should be shaken versus stirred, etc.
  • We picked up crampons, which are basically devices that strap on your boots to give you traction on ice, at the hotel equipment rental shop and used these to walk out on the lake and lakeside trails. The crampons, which are free for hotel guests., aren't necessary, but were helpful. The lake is the hotel's greatest amenity - it is beautiful, and the grounds staff maintains a large skating area by the hotel, and you could x-country ski, snowshoe, or walk across trails to a frozen waterfall on the other side.
  • We skied at Lake Louise for a couple of days, using the hotel shuttle to get back and forth. The shuttles start at 8:30am, and are available on the hour.

A number of people have asked about the construction. There are a large number of rooms blocked off for renovation, in addition to the work on the wellness center, and you will see construction workers both outside the building and in the hallways. Work started around 8am, but - even though our room was close to an area under construction - it didn't bother us. We were up and about at that point, and the noise was not too loud.

All in all, highly recommend the hotel. Let me know if you have any questions.

CanadaDH

So I was at the CLL for a few weeks in March, and here's a bit of an update on the renovations. Currently, the hotel is at very low occupancy, with around 150 of the 550 rooms being rented. They are on a big push to get everything complete, so they can be 100% open by the summer season. The Painter Wing is mostly done. The Glacier Wing is under renovation now, and the Barrott Wing hasn't been started.

I did a rough markup on my floorplans below which I had collected from the back of my suite doors over the years. Actually, with one correction to my markup. I said "Not Being Renovated on the 8th floor, but that's not true. Fairmont Gold is not being renovated, but the rooms below 864, which are not part of Fairmont Gold, are.



They started with the Painter Wing, which are rooms X01 through X39. This includes the 1 Bedroom Lakeview Suites and the 2 Bedroom Mountain View Suites. The renovations are mostly complete here, with the 5th floor rooms open and booked. The other floors still have some rooms being worked on, but many of the rooms are actually in use to house the workers. To ensure things don't fall behind schedule, the construction works are staying on site at the hotel, and working 7 days per week. I saw they were even working on Good Friday and Easter Sunday. I don't know if I should interpret that as a sign they are serious about getting it done quickly, or if it means they fell behind and are trying to catch back up!

The rooms in the Glacier Wing are being renovated now. This is everything above the 2 Bedroom Lakeview Suites (X59). These suites will likely not be touched (but you never know), because they were just done 4 years ago.

As part of the renovations, the Glacier elevator bank have been dedicated to Fairmont Gold, and will only stop at the 7th and 8th floors, as these elevators would be right in the middle of the construction on the lower floors. Guests on other floors need to use the Barrott Elevators.





The centre of the hotel does not appear to have had any construction starting yet, but that's also the smallest section left.

Here are some photos from a little walkabout.

The hotel has always had fire doors between each wing, so these serve as natural breakpoints in the construction zones.



Here's an example of a room in the process of getting some new furniture.



This is a photo coming off the Barrott Elevators, looking down toward the Painter Wing, showing the renovated section, and you can see where the old carpet meets the new.



And this is looking down at the active construction on the Glacier Wing. (Hopefully, they didn't mine me poking around)




And here's a new guest room hallway.



This photo is of the service elevator bank opposite the 1 Bedroom Lakeview Suites (X19). The fact that they have been opened up and dressed up, is making me wonder if they are planning on making these elevators open to guests when they move across to renovate the centre Barrott Wing. That's just a guess on my part, otherwise, why dress up some service elevators?



I can't say I ever heard any construction noises during my stay, and the new rooms look really good.

Not pictured on my floorplan, is the 2nd floor, and it is also being renovated right now. I just don't have a floorplan of the 2nd floor. I'm not sure about the 1st floor. The Mount Temple Wing is not part of the renovation, and is fully open.

There's still some work to do, and we're only 2 months from the start of the summer season. I suppose if they can't get all rooms in the Barrott Wing complete, they could probably work on the remaining rooms, one floor at a time. But it does look like most of the building will be ready to go for the season.

While not part of the guest room floors, below is a picture of the entrance to the Fairmont Spa, which was also just renovated.

nexusCFX

Appreciate the report. Returning here in 2bd lakeview suite in July, which were already renovated previously. Hoping they'll have the construction finished but sounds like they've set it up to have relatively low impact.

CanadaDH

I wouldn't worry about the room construction. You will have to contend with the construction of the new Thermal Wellness Centre outside. I never found it a bother, but you will notice it.

They are hoping to have the structure complete by November (but it's construction, so never a guarantee they'll keep the schedule), at which point the crane at the end of the Painter Wing should be removed, and the work mostly moved inside. You'll be away from that in the 2 bed Lakeview suite.