I stayed in this hotel for 2 nights during August this year, the Indigo hotel is rated a 4 star hotel and often has rates similar to the Intercontinental, which looked like a better hotel in most areas.

We went here for my birthday (my birthday was on the day we checked in), and were expecting to enjoy a nice weekend in Madrid, the hotel has a pool too so on the paper it looked like a perfect place to stay. We booked via the IHG app (which is important later on).

Unfortunately my partner fell quite ill on our second day (with a Kidney infection) so we ended up having to spend most of our weekend in the hotel room because she couldn't move.

Check In

Well, I must say this was the best part of the stay, very friendly staff and the reception area is nice and new/clean.

Room

Now this is where I had big issues, as a reminder this is a 4 star hotel, that is very expensive compared to the competition and is often the most expensive hotel from the IHG portfolio in Madrid. We arrived quite late and had a great night sleep on the first night. When we got up the next day we thought that it was quite dark in the room, so we went to look outside the “window”… And this was catastrophic, there wasn’t a window in the sense “transparent glass shield that gives to the outside world”, the “window” gave to a sort of mini hallway (that they called balcony, that wasn’t big enough for more than one person at once) and then this was over the courtyard. The room being on the first floor and the courtyard being a small gap between the hotel and the next building, there was NO natural light whatsoever, attached is a picture that I took at around midday (in August), curtains wide open when it was over 30°C outside and not a cloud in the sky.

This was a huge issue for us, first of all as we spend most of the weekend in the room (we managed to go out for food on the 2nd day, then back to the airport the 3rd day), and there we NO indications that we had booked such a room: all of the photos of the hotel were nothing like the one we received, and as we booked through the app (for the accelerate promo) it didn’t indicate that it was a restricted/prison cell room.

I know that the AA is a UK standard and that the hotel was in Spain, but in the paragraph 2.6.13 of their hotel quality standard indicates that for any hotel to get a rating (from one to five stars), it requires: “At least one window that can be opened safely and which provides good levels of direct natural light and ventilation”. So I must say that this experience was a HUGE disappointment, and I do not understand how such a room could exist in a 4 star hotel.

Here is the floor plan where you can understand the situation a bit better, the buildings around the hotel were a few stories high also, so the gap between them wasn't letting much light through

Other issues with the room: under the desk they wedge the rack for the luggage, so when you take the chair out it falls on you. This fell on me twice during our stay, badly bruising my foot the 2nd time.

There were also tea bags but no kettle (there is a nespresso machine with nespresso caps)

The shower door had quite a large gap with the wall also, so don’t leave anything on the floor there as it will get wet.

There were positive parts of the room: the artificial lightings were bright and everything was clean and new. And there was a nespresso machine. They gave us a wooden plank of nuts that were in the room when we arrived and free water. The room had a safe and slippers.

Service

Our only interaction was at check in and check out, no issues at check in, and when I discussed about the room at check out they where not surprised that such a room was in their portfolio (“but it has a balcony!”).

Location

Location is great, for a tourist it is a lot better than the Intercontinental. There is also a pharmacist across the road which was of interest for us in this case.

Pool

The rooftop “pool” was nice to cool down, but not possible to swim here as it isn’t adapted (open from 10:30 to 20:00 during summer, can be closed outside of summer). There is also a "lounge" and bar area on the roof (12th floor).

Overall

As you might have understood, I did not like this hotel at all, and I wouldn’t recommend to any of you to book a room here if you can find somewhere else.

And to make things worst, the lifts are painfully slow in the hotel, so I decided to take the stairs one day, I got to my floor, went out towards the rooms, and there was a service trolly in the hallway blocking the access between the area where the stairs are and the area where the rooms are, I dread to think what would have happened if there would have been a fire...