Handlery Hotel - San Francisco
Written: Apr 14 '06 (Updated Apr 14 '06)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Great Location, Clean
Cons: Small Rooms, No Fitness Center
The Bottom Line: The hotel was charming like a B&B yet still gave you the anonymosity of a hotel. Personally, I prefer something a more modern but I still recommend this place.
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| Stephy's Full Review: Handlery Union Square Hotel |
I stayed at the Handlery Union Square Hotel from April 7th-11th, 2006. I was in SF attending a conference and this is one of the hotels that had special rates ($169/night). I choose this hotel based on location and price when I made my reservation.
Check-In
Official check-in time is 3pm. I arrived at 1pm so I had them store my luggage, grabbed some lunch and came back at 3. When I officially check-in, all they had available was a smoking room. :( Luckily once, I got to the room, it didn't smell like smoke. It did take a couple minutes before I was able to find a bellhop to retrieve my stored luggage. (but this was because a couple people who checked in ahead of me who were using their services.)
The Hotel
The hotel had bellhops (there always seemed to be 2 on duty) plus a concierge. There was an on-site restaurant (The Daily Grill - room service was available), a gift shop (which seemed to be open sporadically) and a barber shop. There was a fairly small heated outdoor pool - since the temperature was about 55-60 degrees, I didn't see anyone using the pool. There was a parking garage, I believe the rate with in/out privileges was $32 a day but since I flew to SF, I didn't use it.
The hotel was 8 stories high and divided into two sections to the hotel: the historic section and the club section. The majority of the rooms were located in the historic section and these amenities were included: Cable TV, Mini refrigerators, in-room safe, Coffee machine, hair dryer and irons. The club section included everything that the historic section had plus bathrobes, bathroom scale, shoe polisher and morning newspaper. I was offered a club room upon check-in for an additional $30 a night but I didn't think it seemed worth it. Internet access was available for a fee for both sections.
The Room
I stayed in room 849 in the historic section of the hotel. My view overlooked the corner of Geary and Mason Streets. As soon as I walked into the room, I could see the green-white theme throughout the room - in the carpet, the comforter, the pillows, the window coverings and the bathroom wallpaper; even the table, armoire and desk chair were green. It looked as though the hotel had recently renovated their rooms - everything looked pretty new/clean as well as the walls looked as though the painting was recently done.
The room itself was pretty small, about 14x16, but the bathroom was pretty big at approximately 5x12. In the room, there was a full sized bed, a small desk, a table and TV armoire (as well as the amenities that I listed above like the fridge and safe). The bedroom had 2 windows which took up approximately 60% of the one wall. The windows were covered with 1.5-2 inch (faux) wood blinds which definitely was a classy touch. There was a full-length mirror on the wall. They had provided an extra pillow and blanket in the closet which was nice although I didn't need it. One thing that I like was that the heating controls were automated so I could just set the numeric temperature instead of needing to play around with a dial to figure out a comfortable setting.
As I had mentioned, the bathroom was pretty big. There was another window in the bathroom (this one was tinted so no one could see in.) They had left 4 towels, 4 washcloths and 4 hand towels which was nice in a room that could fit a maximum of two people. They had a sign saying if you want to conserve resources that you should hang up your towels and they wouldn't replace them -- I hung them up and they still replaced them.
I believe the hotel was at full capacity and I couldn't hear noise from other guests but I could hear some noise from outside -- usually sirens, there must have been a police or fire station near by.
The negatives to the room were: 1) there wasn't much closet space. There was enough for my clothes for a 4-night stay but if there was a second person, we would have had issues.
2) The air intake vent on the ceiling was dirty. 3) The adjustable showerhead had two settings, lousy and so-so.
Location
The Handlery was 1/2 block from Union Square and within the main shopping district of SF. For those of you who need their Starbucks, there were 3 located within 1 block from the hotel (as well as other less known coffee shops.) The cable car turnaround was located about 2.5 blocks away from the hotel.
A taxi from the SFO airport to the Handlery will run you about $40 while a shuttle will be about $15.
The Last Day
I had requested a wake-up call at 7am; they called at exactly 7, which I had appreciated since I needed to make an early flight. Check-out went smoothly and then I was on my way home.
Two Strange Things
1. After I got back, I looked at their website (http://www.handlery.com/sf/home.html). I could not find the room I had - their website gives you room options of a king bed, a queen bed or two double beds. Seems very strange to me that I got a room (w/ one double bed) that doesn't seem to exist.
2. Mid-way through my stay, it seems the lock on my door was reset (the key was an electronic card). I went to the front desk and once I showed ID, they rekeyed my access card. I heard the same thing happened to a few other people during their stay.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
Stephy
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Member: Stephanie FZ
Location: Newtown, PA
Reviews written: 19
Trusted by: 15 members
About Me:
A late-20s Penn State Grad
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