khabah

I thought to create this dedicated thread for the upcoming Le Méridien Pasadena Arcadia, a new-build hotel coming up on the site of the former Santa Anita Inn in Arcadia, California. Based on information from various online sources like the owners and architects, the hotel will have 228 rooms, two dining venues, a rooftop pool and outdoor bar overlooking the Santa Anita Park, and dedicated meeting/ballroom facilities with outdoor gardens. Given the location of the hotel across from a thoroughbred racetrack built in the 1930s, the hotel will have Art Deco influences as well as equine references in materials [i.e. leather] and other design elements.

Website is up at this link with not much info and no photos up yet, but I'll attach some renderings from various online sources. Opening May 2021.

khabah

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khabah

Opening May 25th, 2021 according to this article, but rooms don't seem to be available until July 1st. Hotel is Category 5, and opening rates for a two-night stay on July 1st for two comes out to 211 USD nightly.

khabah

bennos

I've booked a one night stay here in late June. Looks convenient for my likely fewer future LA trips.

bennos

I just completed one night here (using up a CC cert) and in summary… I want to like this hotel more than I actually do, and I probably won’t go back. There’s nothing specifically wrong with the hotel, per se, I just don’t think I’m the target demographic.

Firstly, the hotel is now valet parking only, at $27.50/night. I’m 100% sure when I booked it the site said self-parking, free (I never would have booked a valet-only hotel in the middle of a pandemic) but of course I can’t find anything in the historical record about it. I suspect it’s for two reasons: first, there were cars parked in non-spaces this morning. I suspect there simply aren’t enough spaces for the size of the hotel. Second, the lots wraps around the hotel along the perimeter of the priority, and judging by the cars parked overnight I”m pretty sure their clientele doesn’t want to drag their expensive bags around the back of the hotel while trying to keep track of their kids.

I find valet parking super annoying, especially for the sort of stay where I might come and go from the hotel several times during the day, which is exactly the sort of stay I would have in the area. It also adds an element of uncertainty when I check out. For example, this morning I submitted my valet request via the app before checking out. When I got downstairs a while later the car hadn’t been retrieved. Fortunately it was early and I only had to wait 2 minutes, but I don’t need this when I’m trying to get to the airport or whatever.

Beyond the parking situation… Mobile check-in did not issue me a key. The front desk was pretty efficient, though, and I was offered a choice of breakfast or points. (I took the points because of an early departure, so I can’t comment on the quality of the breakfast.) As a Titanium, I was given a standard room on the lowest floor, overlooking a park and the street. It was a bit noisy, though not terrible. TBH, I don’t know that any of the rooms are better or worse, given that they all either face a street or a construction site (apartments going up next door). Housekeeping is on demand only “due to the pandemic” (ie: due to cost reduction), though for a one night stay it didn’t really affect me. From the floor plan, I don’t think there are that many suites.

Inside the room, there is a weirdly high desk with a stool. It’s not exactly uncomfortable, but it’s not great for working, and while there is power it’s sort of scattered all over the place. WiFi was adequate but not particularly fast. (I forgot to run a speed test.) In the king bedroom, there is NO visual privacy for the shower, which is glass. You can’t directly see it from the bed area, but it is exposed to the foyer area by the door. I would hope twin bedrooms wouldn’t use this setup, but I don’t know.

I didn’t get a chance to check out the gym, but the pool is oddly next to the Front Desk.

I’d probably stay at the Westin Pasadena instead if I needed to be downtown, or for driving around one of the limited service brands nearby.

khabah

Thanks for the first review! Bummer it's not all together and wasn't to your liking. Based on the images alone it looks like it turned out quite nicely, although I'm miffed that they nixed having the pool and bar on the rooftop of the hotel and instead stuck a little puddle at the base of the feature wall by the main entrance; it looks more like a pool at a Clarion Inn than a Le Méridien.

Looking forward to having this "no housekeeping due to COVID" thing go away... oy.

khabah

MSPeconomist

Did the ground level pool (outdoors I assume) take away some parking spaces?

khabah

It is outdoors, and it has. I’m attaching this site plan from the architects where you can see that under the original scheme, the pool and an open-air bar sat on the rooftop of the wing housing the lobby, with parking wrapping around the hotel building. I’ve circled the area where the current, smaller pool sits; as you can see, parking and general flow was lost.

Pity - an incorrigible loss of ambience and utility.

khabah

bennos

Physically the hotel does look very nice (if you're into the LM modern design theme), but the analogy to the Clarion Inn seems apt... it feels like a really upscale Fairfield Inn, complete with a pair of single leaf door elevators.

The staff did seem pretty up to speed based on my limited interactions... I forgot to mention in the original post I was pro-actively offered late checkout.

Thanks for the site plan, that's really helpful. They actually kept almost all of the parking in that picture, I think the only spots that might have been lost are the 4 at the bottom of your circle. The driveway itself is exactly as pictured, but their signage is confusing. If you approach from East Huntington like I did, there's a big LE MERIDIEN sign at the entrance. However you have to turn right and drive all the way around the property, because traffic flows one way from the entrance (4) to E Huntington. But as soon as you make that turn there's a confusing "Valet Parking Only" sign that you have no choice but to ignore .

TBH, they should have built a parking deck under the hotel, or to be shared with the adjacent residences. Maybe that's still in the works, as you can see the driveway connects under the residential/retail lawn right above (3).

PhillyPhlier

There is a free parking lot across the street (E Huntington) which is for the Arcadia Park. I don't know about overnight (meaning I know it is free overnight, I just don't know how safe it is although the police station is very close), but perhaps a good option for driving in and out during the day. The Civic Center is on the same block just down the street (past the athletic field) and also has a parking lot (for city hall, etc) but seems to be free for 2 hrs.

rl508

Aside from the Hyatt Place Pasadena, there weren’t any really modern hotel options in the San Gabriel Valley. The Pasadena Westin and Sheraton are really showing their age, and the hotels in Arcadia (Courtyard, Hampton, Residence Inn, Doubletree, Embassy Suites) are all very old and not very pleasant.

Glad for the Le Meridien brand to come into Arcadia and makes sense as it’s clearly intended to appeal to mostly Chinese clientele (most Le Meridiens seem to be focused in SE Asia, China, and Middle East). The design and decor is fresh and feels like a mix between SpringHill Suites and the W, or maybe a Hyatt Centric.

Paid for a one bedroom suite and was assigned a corner room on the top (6th) floor with a partial view of the racetrack and the mountains to the north. Room layout was a little strange as the living room half had no windows and was stuffy whereas the bed had a killer view with floor to ceiling windows. The shower bath combo was really nice and had an Asian feel.

Sound insulation from the hallway was terrible as we heard every slamming door and loud families with kids coming and going. Thankfully this slowed down a bit closer to midnight. Not too much sound from outside. Arcadia is a quieter neighborhood than Pasadena, so fewer cars with obnoxious engines will be blasting by.

Yes the valet situation is annoying and I hope they offer a self park option as the parking lot was clearly designed for this.

Love that they are dog friendly and only charge $50 where many hotels are now charging $75-150 these days. There’s a large park (Arcadia Park) across the street that’s good for letting the fur baby run around.

The hotel gets a lot of local dinner and event traffic so the valet and lobby areas will be pretty packed and happening especially on the weekends and evenings.

I am a Bonvoy Gold and was offered 2pm checkout proactively but not much else. There were two bottles of differently branded water in the room. One had a price tag and the other didn’t but just to be safe I didn’t consume. My suite had a mini fridge but not sure if all rooms have them yet. No coffee maker but the hotel offers free coffee in the mornings.

The nearby Santa Anita Mall is too far to walk (about 25 mins each way) so you’ll need to pull the car out for the 5 min drive but there’s a lot of food options there, mostly Asian.

If I had higher status with Bonvoy and didn’t have Hyatt Globalist, I would totally stay here over the Hyatt Place Pasadena which has gotten stingy with upgrades into their suites and elite treatment overall.

GoSh4rks

Off topic, but the Pasadena Sheraton is relatively newly renovated and sure doesn’t look old.

Not sure about Le Meridien being target towards Chinese clientele - nothing about the brand reminds me of China or anything similar.

rl508

The Pasadena Sheraton might have had some renovations done inside, but I would have a hard time finding someone who would say the words "Sheraton" and "nice" in the same sentence. The exterior still looks like a 1940's bunker and the structural limitations will never allow it to feel fresh and airy.

There are about 50 Le Meridiens in Asia (half of their brand footprint) and almost 20 alone in China, so it would be a brand the Chinese are familiar with. This one in particular is located right in Arcadia with a 60%+ Chinese population (not like the other "Arcadia" hotels which are closer to Monrovia) and has dual signage (English/Chinese) all over the place with many bi-lingual staff.

azepine00

In the heart of San Gabriel Valley (where mandarin or cantonese are spoken more than english) there is a fairly new Sheraton San Gabriel in addition to Hilton and a couple other chain places that opened along Valley blvd. Hyatt place was being built there too - not sure on status but another building that looks like Sheraton SGV is nearing completion between sheraton and hilton. Of course all of those are closer to 10 rather than 210 (5 min vs 15 ish) so it depends on where you need to be.


Also i am not aware of any meaningful upgrade benefit that should be expected from hyatt place - if you got suite upgrades they went way way above and beyond...

khabah

The owners of this hotel are originally Chinese, and between the hotel offering an Asian fusion restaurant, Arcadia having a majority Asian population and the Le Méridien brand being very respected and a desirable, borderline luxury brand in China, it makes sense that this hotel has a slight slant towards an Asian and particularly Chinese customer base. I didn't know the signs are bilingual - wow, a sign of the times!

I absolutely love the Le Méridien brand and am always excited to see new locations open up, but I want to like this hotel more than I do. Granted, I haven't stepped into it but between all the pictures and reviews I've seen, something about it looks and feels a bit... cheap and hollow to me. Maybe it's the open space and emptiness surrounding the peacock art in front of the reception desk, the fact that the rooms were meant to have a sophisticated equestrian inspiration but came out to anonymous designs with weird/lazy mosaic-style wallpaper covering an entire wall, and that they skipped the destination rooftop pool for an unappealing and downmarket solution fronting the main road and surrounded by parking on one side and the driveway on the other.

After having followed the hotel every step of the way of its development, the feeling I get can be summed up as this: it was meant to be better than it turned out.

khabah

NYC Flyer

I toured it during final construction phase with some other STARS/Luminous agents and was sufficiently impressed, other than the somewhat meager pool offering--the outdoor areas seem tailored to weddings, etc. vs. enjoyment by all guests.

I would give it a chance.