Location, Location, Location...and nothing else.
I booked a two night weekend stay at Hotel Valencia with great anticipation for a fantastic weekend. Sometimes reality is a very disappointing entrée. I’ve been a Los Angeles based visitor to the Bay Area for ten years and have always been very excited to try Hotel Valencia but never had the chance until April 2012. The location was obviously perfect for San Jose – smack in the middle of Santana Row amid a beautiful, walkable mall with plenty of shopping, dining and nightlife. It’s also across the street from the area’s biggest and most luxurious mall – Valley Fair. What could go wrong? Well, the hotel is a poorly executed, cheap “W” Hotel wannabe without service, luxury, or design. Let me start by stating that the service was perfectly adequate. All of the staff I encountered were polite and helpful so my review is not based on a poor customer service experience. That said, the personal attention that I’ve come to expect at higher end hotels was not on display either which is probably reflective of a lower staff to guest ratio. The real problem with Hotel Valencia is the décor. The interior is as dark as a dungeon. Dark can be hip. But in this case its uninviting, uninspiring, and cheap looking. The carpet in the halls is worn and the lighting is all encapsulated behind perforated metal so that the lights cast shadows on the walls of the hallways. I’m a sucker for creative inexpensive design solutions and this is one that went horribly awry. But the lousy design doesn’t stop there. The hotel room itself is average in size and furnished with cheap (again) oversized furniture that has a major lack of functionality and decorative appeal. The first example is the bed which features a wooden frame that’s substantially larger than the mattress and provides a very hard object perfect for stubbing toes and bumping shins. The room also featured a ginormous glass vase filled with sticks…a decoration better suited to a huge lobby table…but stuffed into the corner of my hotel room taking up a ton of room and looking outdated and dusty (gross). Finally the windows featured black shutters which prevented any natural light from entering the room. Overall the room was what I would describe as a very modest upgrade from a run-of-the mill Hampton Inn. In fact, a few days later I visited some family staying at a new Courtyard Marriott in the Sacramento area and I was substantially more impressed with the décor in their lobby and room. Hotel Valencia has a lot of potential and a fantastic location. At under $200 a night it’s probably a reasonable value. But beware that the hotel is woefully outdated and beginning to show its age. It is not on par with a typical offering from W Hotels. If location is critical – give it a go. If style, service, and amenities are what you’re after you can probably find a better hotel in San Jose.