Sheraton Seoul Palace Gangnam [Master Thread]
 

Currently staying at this property, used to be the Palace Hotel Gangnam. Just rebranded to a Sheraton yesterday.

Check-in was smooth and efficient but no upgrade benefits whatsoever. Would have appreciated even a corner room or a room on the club floor but got exactly what i booked on a regular spg floor.

The room itself is just ok. Nothing too fancy and definitely on the smaller size compared to Westin Chosun or Sheraton D Cube or Sheraton Incheon. And even though this place had been refurbished to comply with the Sheraton Brand, it doesnt look new. Doesnt look like the ones on the website photos. There is also no place to put my luggage but on the ottoman or on top of the TV desk. Windows are quite dirty as well.

As for the club lounge, It is located on the 12th floor. Not as big as the other seoul lounges but had quite a number of food offerings during happy hour. Looks like a Chinese Buffet style layout with all those heated metal trays side by side - Chinese inspired food of course like barbq pork, fried rice, spring rolls, etc.

Anyways to get here from ICN, take KAL bus 6073 for 16K KRW. Takes about 70-80 minutes. Hotel is first stop from airport so that means Its the first departure to the airport, stopping at several other hotels in Gangnam prior to leaving for ICN. So plan accordingly.

As for any Ambasador level Platinum treatment, i didnt feel any. Wasnt even greeted with a simple "hello" at the lounge considering there were 4 agents manning the desk. In fact my room had a "Welcome Mr. Kim" card on it. Dont know who Mr. Kim is.

Would i stay here again? Probably not until a few more years as a starwood property considering there are other Starwood options in Seoul. The treatment i get as an Ambassador level guest or even when I was Platinum50 at D'Cube or Chosun or Incheon where i recently stayed is like night and day..

Front desk at lobby and bellmen were really nice though.

Thanks for the review. Been thinking about booking this place. How's the access to Myeong-dong and the shopping and food areas?

Myeong-dong is 4.5 miles and itaewon is 2.7 miles :p
As for surrounding area, all i see are apartment buildings in this area

Great.. staying there next week and booked a regular room. Guess i'll have to press for bennies!

Thanks for the headsup.

Stayed here three nights last week. Exact same experience as OP. No room upgrade at all - I got what was booked and nothing more. Lounge is good for breakfast and decent evening snacks - wine & beer offerings were pretty bad though. Staff in lounge and in lobby were excellent.

--Did you ask for an upgrade at check in?

--Did you check for availability on the website around the time you checked in to get a general idea of the extent to which various room categories were still available? If the hotel was sold out for your dates, you wouldn't generally expect to get an upgrade.

I got upgraded to a Studio Suite from the standard room on a 2 night stay here. I emailed the hotel two days before checkin, having seen supatight80's review above.

Will post a review when I have time, but in sum, I think that the staff try hard to please guests (at least in this opening phase).

However, there are a few shortcomings in terms of the hard product here, which will make me hesitant to return. The club lounge is very nice though (but didnt go for evening service).

No I didn't ask for an upgrade - after 14 hours on a plane and 2 hours from Incheon airport I was too tired to do so. Normally if I'm on a short stay I don't (I'm pretty low maintenance) but most Starwood hotels will upgrade as a matter of course unless sold out. I was just echoing the OP's comments - no upgrade; not even to club floor.

I had a week there and was extremely un impressed, I had even reached out to the GM before hand after reading poor reviews.

Nowhere close to the D Cube, will be going back there from now on.

Has treatment of SPG Plats gotten better here since the first few months? I just booked a stay.

I would say no, I think based on the staff attitudes it will be a while before this is a real Starwood property,

Just checked in, and not impressed. I have received no noticeable upgrade, and the room, while "recently renovated" is pretty lackluster with little space, some worn finishings, and a horribly noisy… something… below the couch. I'm gonna go back down and ask for a better room. I see they're still selling a premier club suite for the first 2 days which looks a lot better.

Also somehow ended up with a room with 2 bed (queen + single) which is a waste of space for me.

Were you able to explore the local area any further? My understanding is this hotel is not that far from the Express Bus Terminal where there should have been many dining and shopping options. Any further information you can share would be most appreciated.

Its been awhile since i was there. If im not mistaken hotel is about 10 min drive to JW and Hyatt. And then there are the malls much closer to the latter 2 properties. My memory is quite rusty as was there only overnight and passed by the malls coz it was the route back to ICN by shuttle.

Anyways IMHO, id suggest you stay somewhere else. Not really a nice property compared to the other Starwoods there

It looks closeby on the map, but you have to walk about a fair while through the subway station, down escalators etc. Probably about 15 minutes from the hotel to the platform.