Relais Piazza di Spagna

The "hotel" was great but almost impossible to find with the wrong address listed on their web site and a fax number listed as their phone number. We asked a retail employee across literally across the street where the "hotel" was located and they had no idea.

Our stay at this hotel was really unpleasant, and we are pretty sure the people that own this hotel are cheats. Our experience led us to believe that they run a horrible hotel for ridiculous prices in an effort to extort as much money as possible out of their unknowing guests, while attempting to work as little as possible and provide the most basic level of service, value, and cleanliness. Rome was our last stop after traveling around for a few weeks, and we had had great luck on hotels on our stay thus far. When we arrived the guy working at the check in counter was pretty rude and unfriendly (we think he was the son of the owners or something because he was only about 16 and clearly did not care about the possibility of losing his job). Anyways, we get to our room and it is unpleasant and uncleanly, evincing a general lack of good taste. It has floor to floor carpeting (with added throw rugs) and distasteful tapestry lining every single inch of the walls. The fabric on the walls was dark navy blue, and basically made the lighting seems like it was about 8 pm at night even when it was a gorgeous sunny day at 8 in the morning. As you can imagine, the wall to wall, floor to ceiling carpeting made it smell unsavory at best, and the room was really stuffy and smelled stale. It did not smell clean and the tapestry walls had visible dust all over it. We had to keep the window open almost constantly to make it bearable, and it was extremely noisy outside of our window. It was also very warm at night, and although this hotel advertised that it had AC, we found out the first night they do not turn the AC on until June. They were not polite in dealing with the situation, and we had to leave the window open all night. It literally felt like we were sleeping in the busy street below it was so loud. Then the next night we wanted water out of our minibar after a long day and night out and about; the only bottle was unsealed. Whether the bottled was refilled by previous guests and unnoticed by the help, or put there with the knowledge of the hotel staff in an effort to extort a few more dollars out of their guests, we do not know. When we complained the next morning the woman working the front desk was rude and unapologetic. We asked if she could get us a taxi to the airport the next morning, as we had an early flight back to the US out of Rome's Da Vinci airport. We had read that a law in Italy was recently enacted requiring taxi drivers to charge no more than 40 euro from inside the city of Rome to the airport. The lady said she would call a taxi for us, and when we came down extremely early the next morning with all of our bags, there was a luxury car service waiting that wanted to charge us 55 euro for a ride. We complained and told the hotel staff we were aware of the law, and the hotel "magically" worked it out so the cost of the car would be 40 euro instead of 55 euro. When we got in the car the driver was a really nice guy, and through my bad italian and his bad english we were able to converse. He told us that he was told to charge us 55 euro instead of 40 by the hotel staff, which he thought was strange. He also told us that he has had problems with the staff at this hotel before, and that the people in charge of the hotel were "not good." Please don't stay here. It was really, really gross and unclean, and the people were horrible swindlers. Trust me.

The room and staff were good, but impossible to find, and the first floor is an empty dungeon. Should have a better sign (the door bell button to ring was rubbed down, and no notice on the empty dungeon like first floor that you have to go upstairs. No other facilities other than the room, which is okay for the price, but wish I had known that!

Room was great; shower great but leaking and location the best in Rome.

The room was charming,elegant and large. The location is literally steps from the Spanish Steps and the wonderful square. There are many excellent restaurants and great shopping at designer stores all around you. We especially enjoyed breakfast served in the dining area that was part of our room. Definitely would stay there again.

The Relais Piazza di Spagna was located within a couple of blocks of the Spanish Steps, hence the name. It was also within walking distance to many other of Rome's highlights including the Trevi Fountain and the Via Veneto. The continental breakfast was good and unexpected. Would definitely recommend this hotel to everyone and would stay there again if I had the opportunity.