l etoile

I was here last month and am just leaving a three-night stay. The hotel has been full during this visit. I had a large suite on the top and had a second room that was upgraded to a suite. The door and desk staff at this property are quite good. The housekeeping staff is deficient - one day a robe was left rumpled on a chair rather than hung, another day a robe was removed from my room and not replaced, a dirty towel was left on the floor, dirty glasses (not from in-room dining) were never removed/replaced/cleaned, a pillow case was left on the floor, surfaces are not dusted, I asked for turndown each night and received it 1/3. Those are just a few samples of the deficiencies. They are not problematic enough to keep me away, but the change in housekeeping is apparent.

As for protests here, there is a trailer parked across the street (was here last month too) with a banner on it that says to boycott Hyatt, but I've never seen any people around associated with what appears to be a very passive protest.

pshuang

Ah, it should have occurred to me that you might be out here for MIT Commencement weekend, l'etoile; we could have met over breakfast.

I booked my 2-night stay using NBT + BWB award nights through my Hyatt personal line rep. I was pleased with there being availability despite it being MIT Commencement weekend. I took a red-eye flight to Boston and meant to contact the hotel GM earlier about an early check-in; but was too busy to get around to it until I flew into Logan Airport. The hotel front desk person communicated my choices clearly. I was marked to get a Lafayette suite, but there wouldn't be one available for early check-in (they were all occupied overnight). There was a corner suite I was welcome to have immediately, however, and I opted for that. When I checked in, I got a corner suite on the 14th floor. The room is well outfitted with furniture, not overly crowded but not gobs of empty floor space, either. As others noted, a corner suite here isn't really a suite by the usual definition, but since I was solo on this trip, getting a true suite wasn't a priority. TV was a 25" Panasonic tube, not a flatscreen; but I rarely turn on the TV except occasionally to check my folio.

As a Diamond, I received breakfast vouchers marked for the full breakfast buffet. At my request, they swiftly produced another breakfast buffet coupon for an extra day's breakfast (I arrived early enough to have breakfast on my check-in day). I was not offered choice of Diamond arrival amenities; I was feeling too zombie-like from my flight to remind the trainee front desk clerk about it. Breakfast buffet setup is very nice; not the very best I've experienced but the offerings were well up there both in tastiness and presentation. I especially like the made-to-order eggs station -- a well-cooked spinach and mushroom egg whites omelet is a great guilt-free way to start the day.

Useful details about the T: the Silver Line option from the airport is a nice improvement from the past when it was difficult to take the T between any Red Line station and the airport. (As a starving college student, I used to do the crazy connections option: Red Line to Green Line to Blue Line to shuttle bus.) I didn't scope out whether there was a stair-free way to transfer from the Silver Line to the Red Line at South Station since I only had my rolling case carry-on. After taking the Red Line to the Downtown Crossing station, I wasn't sure which exit to take, but took the correct one by accident -- you want the exit marked Chauncy Street. When you emerge at street level, turn right, and after walking 100 yards along Chauncy Street, turn into the parking garage on your right. There's no external Hyatt signage, but once inside you can't miss the entrance for the street level lobby for the Hyatt. This street level lobby for the Hyatt also has another exit out onto the sidewalk on the other side. It has elevators up to the third floor where the check-in lobby and the Avenue One restaurant is; there are then separate elevators from there up to the guest rooms. A bit of an odd design, but one which probably cannot be remedied by the hotel management without tearing down the building entirely.

pshuang

A few more comments:

In general the hotel is oddly laid out because the building is not rectilinear. For example, the gym is accessed from the sixth floor all the way down the long hallway from the elevators. You then go down a staircase to the hotel card key operated door, through which is another long hallway, then down a pair of short staircases, and finally there you are. The pool is closed for renovation until June 13th. They were diligently working on it, starting to bang away at 8:00am on Sunday, for example. The fact that the gym was far away from any guest rooms was a plus, the noise wouldn't have bothered anybody trying to sleep in. Gym has 4 treadmills, 4 exercise bikes, 5 ellipticals, 2 rowing machines, plenty of free weights, 4-5 Nautilus type machines, exercise mats, balls, etc. There's a proper men's locker room, women's locker room, and a sauna. You can't ask for a better selection of towels -- they had full size bath towels (which I always use to cover exercise mats), hand towels, and both dry face towels and refrigerated damp face towels.

l etoile

Ah, darn! Would have been good to see you!

futureacnp

Just checked in to this hotel around noontime today. I used one of my confirmed suite upgrade certs and booked into a Lafayette Suite. I was initially assigned room #1401, but was given room #1001 instead as the other room wasn't ready.

During check in I was asked how many people will be having breakfast tomorrow morning. I asked for two coupons, but it seems like they would've not minded if I asked for more coupons. I can confirm that diamond guests receive complimentary FULL breakfast (instead of free continental bfast with an option to upgrade it to full bfast with an extra fee as stated in previous posts).

The room is located at the end of the hallway with a weird, triangle-like shape. It looks rather outdated with old tube TVs in the living area and the bedroom. The bathroom is stocked with the Quincy-bergamot portico products, and they have added thungs like razors, shaving gel, sewing kit, shower caps, etc that you wouldn't normally find in most standard rooms without requesting them.

The refrigerator in the room is the so-called "smart fridge" that automatically adds charges to the folio upon removal of items. There is also a keurig coffee maker (the fancy one with many selections of beverages).

No regency club lounge or floors as the hotel was previously a swissotel. It is located a couple of blocks from the downtown crossing Or Chinatown t stations.

Not worth 200+/night in my opinion, but if you have to choose between this property and HR Cambridge, I'd probably choose this one for the sake of convenience.

ig88d

Just my 2 cents, the gym if very nice for a hotel gym, however if it is not handicap accessible, no elevator, multiple sets of stairs and long hallways. So if you are in a wheelchair or disabled, there is no access. I had hurt my back right before our visit in April and it was very difficult to get down there to use the steam room and almost impossible to get back up.

devastor

No regency club. ugh! I was going to use my Platinum Extras Cert for an regency club upgrade.

I was planning on staying here in Oct. But it sounds the hotel is an awesome location but needs a face-lift. What about parking?

pshuang

In my post #118 in this thread, I described how to get from the Downtown Crossing T station into the hotel -- you enter the hotel parking garage car entrance as a pedestrian. I didn't check the price of parking (a quick call to the hotel would tell you that) but I imagine that's the most convenient option. There are also various surface parking lots in the neighborhood. The immediate neighborhood is a bit desolate (pot holes in the asphalt, lots of cracks in the sidewalks, broken glass debris in the gutters, that sort of thing). If you had a very nice car I could imagine you being a little uncomfortable leaving your car overnight in one of the neighborhood lots.

If you're flying from your home town Houston to Boston and you're doing fairly typical touristy things or are doing business in Cambridge or Boston, you should at least consider skipping renting a car. Boston, like many other densely populated Northeast cities, is not very car friendly. Lots of one-way streets, congestion, hard to find parking where you are going and parking can be expensive. This hotel being so close to a MBTA subway (T) station makes going carless quite plausible.

devastor

Thanks for the input. We are staying there for about 4 days and was going to rent a car to drive up north to see the leaves. So probably going to have a car overnight. I heard the subways are the way to go. We are going to try to catch a Sox game and probably use the subway for that.

FriendlySkies

I am looking at staying at this property in April, and I am curious if anybody has had experiences within the last month or two. Have things improved at all? From some earlier reports, it sounded as though house keeping was not the best. Do they still lack a regency club? Thanks!

frogss29

Here now....no club
Housekeeping is great.
All the staff are cheerful and helpful.
Restaurant (breakfast and dinner) is good.
Rooms are a little tired.
Good location and BEAUTIFUL city!

Quasiconvexity

Had a pleasant 2 night stay at this property recently. Was upgraded into a Lafayette suite in advance using one of my suite upgrade certs. The room itself was large, sunny and in good shape, with two large LCD TVs and a balcony (the bathroom could use some refurbishment, though). The staff were truly exceptional throughout the stay, from the doormen all the way to the restaurant waiters. Solid stay overall.

DHalltheway

does anyone have the e-mail for the sales/reservation office for this Hyatt hotel?

agrater

I was there for 3 nights last summer. No problems with housekeeping then. In general, criticism of housekeeping is suspect because the property is at great odds with union sympathizers since it outsourced housekeeping.

There was a truck parked outside during my stay with pro-union, anti-Hyatt signage.

PromoGoogler

I had a great 3 night stay over the weekend. The suite was spacious and clean. There were two flat screens but Hyatt Regencies that I've stayed at don't have HD channels yet. Hyatt Place does as well as Marriott and Starwood Properties.

There's no regency club but I got comp'ed breakfast buffet at Avenue One. The waiter is great. He noticed that I didn't get a spoon for my oat meal and put one on my table within 30 seconds. The last day I missed the buffet cut-off time. He told me I could just order off the menu and he'll make sure it gets comp'ed. The concierge was also nice. Since this hotel has a business center with $5 minimum charge, the concierge lady had me email my document (3 pages) to her and printed them out for me.

This hotel is in close walking distance to Chinatown. However, if you want all the high end shops, stay at hotels by Copley Square.