After disappointments in spring 2017 at both The Liberty (non-working air con in the Charles River Suite with pitiful management response) and W Boston (poor service and management issues), I decided to finally try the Ritz-Carlton Boston in spring 2018 amidst my almost 4 weeks of consecutive business travel on the East Coast.

I even found a fantastic $600 AAA rate for an Executive Suite for 3 nights over Easter weekend. It was almost too good to be true!

The Ritz-Carlton Boston is an excellent luxury hotel with 193 rooms and suites. It often is confused with the Ritz-Carlton Boston Common, which WAS a separate hotel property at a different address that is now the Taj Boston. I have added the correct information above--hopefully so that FlyerTalk can correct it! (Even FlyerTalk only lists this property erroneously as Ritz-Carlton, Boston Common!)

The Ritz-Carlton Boston is a great luxury hotel with overall excellent service and recently renovated and refreshed rooms and suites--though the bathrooms not having been part of that renovation is curious to me. However, I did have a major air con fail in my upgraded Luxury Suite for my first night, and that failure was not handled as well as it should have been IMO. 

Ultimately, my last two nights were in my originally booked Executive Suite--and the air con worked gloriously well in that Executive Suite. Ironically, I actually preferred the Executive Suite's abundance of natural light and larger windows to the slightly more spacious but otherwise much darker Luxury Suite.

Were the room/suite rates competitive, I would be delighted to stay again at the Ritz-Carlton Boston.

The front entrance off Avery Street, just a block off the Boston Common:

Lobby and reception, with the entrance to the bar in the background:

The entrance to the hotel restaurant, Artisan Bistro, was to the right immediately on entering the hotel:

Reception, with some friendly FD agents:

The hotel bar was intimate and quite comfortable, with all sorts of niches to enjoy and in which to relax:

The 11th floor elevator area and hallway:

If I remember correctly, the hotel rooms are all on the 11th - 14th floors of the building. The Equinox Sports Club, which doubles as the hotel gym for $15/day if you don't pay for the Club Level, has direct elevator access, as well (and also is located directly next door on the ground level).

Check In

Check in was quite easy and smooth--and surprised with thew new that I had been upgraded from the Executive Suite to the Luxury Suite. Within a few minutes, I was directed (but not escorted, which was fine with me) to the elevators to my suite on the 11th floor.

Room

LUXURY SUITE, Room 1132

The Luxury Suite was located very close to the elevator bay area, though on the opposite side as the elevators.

There was a entry corridor, to the right of which was a small bar area and the powder bath:

The living room was spacious but not filed with a lot of natural light by its relatively small window:

The view wasn't much to speak of:

The chair against the wall seemed very oddly place to me. As if it were very clumsily trying to demarcate the end of the living room and beginning of the dining room?

The bedroom was quite spacious but suffered the same lack of natural light from its small window, much like the living room:

The bedroom view again wasn't much to speak of, especially from such a narrow window:

The hallway to the master bath include plentiful closet space:

The master bath was spacious but looked less fresh than the rest of the suite. Once I moved suites later and spoke with the GM, I learned why: the bathrooms had not been included in the rooms/suites renovation.

The suite was very spacious and comfortable, but it had two glaring faults: the natural light was lacking, and the air conditioning and thermostats apparently didn't work at all:

EXECUTIVE SUITE, Room 1160

After having massive issues and constant back-and-forth arguments with the front office management and engineering department, they finally moved me late Saturday afternoon to the Executive Suite category that I'd originally booked.

The Executive Suite was almost identical to the Luxury Suite, except that it lacked the dining room area. On the other hand, the Executive Suite had much larger windows allowing much more natural light.

A much better peek-a-boo view to the Boston Common:

The Executive Suite master bedroom was perhaps a bit smaller and separate by frosted doors rather than the slightly larger bedroom separated by the solid door in the Luxury Suite. Otherwise, I found the spaces in the two suites to be almost identical. The biggest difference was the lack of dining area in the Executive Suite. 

The air conditioning worked like a charm in the Executive Suite:

And the thermostats actually were accurate:

Unfortunately, the shower floor in the Executive Suite was not designed well and drained terribly--the slope was actually to the corner even as the drain was in the center, leaving a disgusting puddle when you showered:

In mentioning that to the GM, he did indicate that the bathrooms had not been included in the recent room/suite renovation. But this was so blatant and poor that I'd think they would fix it pretty quickly. Not impressive.

Otherwise, I much preferred the Executive Suite to the Luxury Suite. The minor difference in size and lack of a dining area was more than made up for by the bigger windows, better view, much more natural light, and the wildly better air conditioning. We can just hope that they fix the drainage issue in that shower.

Service

Service was quite disappointing with regard to the air conditioning fail in my Luxury Suite, but otherwisen was excellent for everything else during my stay. 

On entering the Luxury Suite after check in and seeing it at 72 F, I immediately called to have engineering set the thermostatst to VIP so they living room and bedroom both would stay at 65 F for the duration of my stay, even when I left the room. But no one came after an hour, so I called again. it took two calls to get an engineer to come up and VIP the room. Really?

On returning to the Luxury Suite after midnight on that same night, I saw that the room had returned to 72 F! I was furious. I called and had the night manager and engineer come to the room to see for themselves. I also showed them with my thermometer how their thermostats were not accurate. They both seemed befuddled, and no one offered to move me to another room. So I went to sleep after they reset the system yet again.

The next morning, I had numerous conversations with the front office manager. It actually got quite contentious, and she didn't seem to understand that depiste their system telling them it was 65 F, my thermometer was showing it at 71 F. While at lunch, their team was supposed to fix the issue or move my room.

I returned from lunch and it was a little warm, so I called to complain again. They said someone would call back, but in the meantime they brought fans.I fell asleep only to awaken by a housekeeper walking in. The room had again reset to 72 F! 

I was apoplectic and insisted I be moved. They moved me within 30 min to the new Executive Suite. Only then did everyone start to recognize the nonsense they had put me through, and recognize that they had an air con fail, indeed, in the Luxury Suite. I was pretty pissed.

Once I moved, the hotel did (at my insistence) comp me the full first night's rate. In my opinion, that was the least they should have done after the poor way they handled the issue. It turned out that they did comp two room service orders, as well, so I decided to move on.

In the end, once I moved to the Executive Suite, my stay was pretty much flawless. The room service staff was very helpful and prompt. The bartenders in the bar couldn't have been nicer and more helpful. The front desk staff checked in on me a few times, and so did the managers. The valets were always quick to get me a taxi or give me walking directions. Everyone was incredibly helpful and friendly. 

Overall, i'd give the hotel a 4/5 for service. The really screwed the pooch on the air con issue, but I really do feel like they turned the corner once they realized I wasn't crazy and it had been handled poorly. Other than that, really the service was stellar.

FWIW, I did on that first morning, terribly frustrated by the RC failures and inability to move me, call the Four Seasons Boston, the Mandarin Oriental Boston, and the XV Beacon Hotels to see about moving hotels. As it turned out, the FS and XV both admitted they couldn't guarantee below 69-70 F in their room/suites. The MO manager said he'd try to set a room to 65 F and call me back; he never did call back. 

So it looks like the RC Boston is the right luxury hotel for me in Boston--as long as I choose the right room/suite with the air con working properly! 

FWIW, I also had a great stay at the W Boston this past weekend, just 2 weeks after my Easter weekend stay at the RC Boston. The air con worked even better there in the Wow Suite and had tremendous service on that stay (and even last year's probematic stay had excellent air con in a deluxe room), so the RC Boston and W Boston are most certainly my go-to hotels for all future stays in Boston!

Dining

Dining was excellent. 

Room service breakast on my first morning--absolutely delicious chocolate chip pancakes with bananas and a wonderful cappacinio.

My room service breakfast the next morning---another excellent made to order omelette:

My yummy lunch on my final afternoon before departure:

Between the bar and room service, I was very impressed by the food/beverage here at the RC Boston. I'd give it the edge over the W Boston and very comparable to The Liberty based on previous stays. 

Location

The RC Boston is well located just a block off the Common, and it is just a 10 min walk to the FS Boston, where we had drinks one night (I vastly prefer the more intimate bar at the RC over the large corporate bar at the FS). It's just a 10-15 min walk to the W Boston. 

Overall

Overall, despite the air con fail and difficultty in getting moved more quickly to the Executive Suite, I left very pleased with my stay at the RC Boston. I feel their recovery, while delayed, was adequate--comp'ing my the first night's stay and 2 orders of room service for my trouble and frustration.

The service levels otherwise were to a very high standard for the rest of my stay. I loved the food/beverage. The air con eventually worked very well in the Executive Suite. I found both suites to be extremely comfortable and liked the new masculine design of the renovated suites (and rooms).

Were the rate competitive, I certainly will look forward to returning to the RC Boston.