Review of W London 5*

I have always loved the W brand of hotels. I love the ultra-urban styling, modern trimmings and just the electric energy of the whole thing. W London as with others fits the bill and you can expect the same energy staying here. The hotel is located at the center between Piccadilly Circus and Leicester Square, right at the start of Chinatown. This location makes the hotel incredibly beneficial to me, as well as detrimental. Explain later below. The lobby, located on the 2nd floor also houses the lounge which gets extremely busy in the evenings and weekends, almost like a hip club. In fact, over the weekends while I was staying here, there was a long line outside just to get into the lounge. Of course as a staying guest, you can bypass the line completely, join the bar or head on to the room. Security is great as well, so despite the influx of party-goers, I don’t feel unsafe. The room itself is small. There’s no getting away from that. Like many European hotels, especially those right smack at the centre of everything, the trade off is the room size. But you get use to. So here’s what I like about the room. The room is well designed to make use of the small space of the hotel. Everything from the bathroom, the toilet, the clothes cabinet are hidden away in closet structure. Even the room itself can be closed off like a closet from the main door to insulate further the sound. So space usage is efficient. Together with the usual bath amenities, they are excellent. What I hate about the room, is how they integrated the room table with the sink counter. Which means, if you need to do some work and have your computer out, it’ll be sharing the same counter top as the sink. I cannot imagine the potential of calamities should water damage computers. I much prefer a separate working table like the ones in other W Hotel, which is usually integrated in the same wall as the TV. I also dislike the auto-charging system of the minibar. Many hotels have this installed now but that means I could not use the fridge to store any drinks I might have brought along with me. Bummer. The biggest selling point of W is of course, it’s location. Fair warning: it’s crowded outside. On some days, it’s also very noisy due to crowds gathering in the area. It also means that at times, you might be checking in on a peak hour, hence getting in and out of taxi could be witnessed by plenty of people. The W staff is of course a great help during those times. Being here also means getting here during peak period is a nightmare if you are in a car. Taxi rides take longer and if you drive, there is no onsite parking. Past those points, the location for this W is superbly strategic. Right in between 2 important Tube stations (Piccadilly Circus and Leicester Square) means you can get anywhere in London during the stay without ever calling a cab. Not once I had to use the cab while in London. In some instances, taking the iconic double decker red bus (which is plentiful) could get you to your destination even faster than the train. Right outside the door is also the entrance to Chinatown, and a little afar is Shaftesbury Avenue, which means getting to London’s theatre-land is incredibly convenient. It’s also at the doorstep to SoHo, giving you one of the best choices of restaurants, bars and cafes in the entire of London. The number of delicious hip outlets that I pass by everyday makes my mouth water every time I think about it. Outside my room window, I could actually see the London Eye and Westminster, giving you an idea how close it is to walk should you choice to, to Westminster, Trafalgar Square and Covent Garden. This is my 4th visit to London, but my first in W. So this trip, my goal is more towards the food, the hangouts, the theatre and W would be my choice if I want easy access to all of those in a hip location. Look past the tourist hoards outside and enjoy that convenience above all. After all, you are kinda of a tourist too.