The Suit Place

N37°16.163' E127°0.425' Lonely Planet, Rough Guide and Tripadvisor did not gave us a clear indication what hotel to look for in the city centre of Suwon near the Hwaseong fortress in September 2014. The major business hotels, like the good IBIS hotel, are off centre to the south. The road from the central train station, the Maesanro, to the Paldalmun, the south gate of the fortress, offered some love motels. We were not that enthusiastic about these offering. We asked an English-speaking staff member of the visitor information booth in front of the central train station for a clean budget hotel room. The response: "where the Japanese stay". This was the Suite Place Serviced Residence. We checked availability and price on Tripadvisor and walked in the rain to this hotel. Reception asked KRW 110.000 for one night. Expedia on Tripadvisor quoted a price of KRW 90.000. We started discussing the price difference. In the beginning, reception kept their foot down on the price, so in the lobby we started the online booking process with Expedia, the owner of Tripadvisor, for KRW 90.000. During this booking process, the Expedia price jumped with KRW 20.000 for tax & fees to KRW 110.000. We personally hate this business practice and within our country by law, unavoidable costs to the consumer have to be included in the final price beforehand. Expedia is misleading the customer by continuing this consumer unfriendly practise. Meanwhile the reception offered the room for KRW 99.000 and we settled. The former Dormy Inn Services Residences is a special logging. As the name implies, it is a building with furnished luxury apartments for long-term rental. Some apartments are not long-termed rented and are offered for short-stay to hotel guests. This means that The Suite Place has few hotel amenities beside a car park, but strangely, breakfast was included. This is not common in South Korea. When we left the elevator on the 10th floor, we entered grim and grubby hallways, you sometimes find in service basements. The carpet looked dirty and bars were fitted in front of windows. Not a good first impression, but this flipped 180° opening the door of our room 1016. Behind the grim hallway appeared a very nice luxury apartment with full kitchen and washing machine (with washing powder), living room and sofa, bedroom with double bed and duvet, bathroom with shower cabin and a study. Everything fitted for long-stay use and very clean. Broadband Internet in the apartment gave us excellent Wi-Fi reception. Air conditioner did the cooling. Breakfast is served in the coffee shop next to the reception on the ground floor (1F). It was an excellent Korean, Japanese and continental breakfast buffet and we enjoyed it. The Suite Place is an excellent and clean offering near the city centre and central train station. For the price of a hotel room, you find yourself in a luxury apartment well suited to many more nights with good breakfast. Unfortunately, Suwon city beside the Hwaseong fortress does not offer any reason to stay multiple nights.

Stayed two weeks here on business and this is a three star hotel. The staff is helpful and friendly. The free breakfast is not full of choices but what is available is decent. The hallways leading to the apartments are in dire need of replacement, not a good first impresssion. Once inside, the rooms are large and clean with a bedroom, living room, full kitchen, bathroom and small office. Plenty of space to move around and even a washing machine for clothes. The beds are typical Korean, hard and low to the ground. The furnishings are very dated, the TVs are tube (in Korea? really?)and the couch is very used and uncomfortable, needs replacing badly.

The Dormy Inn Suwon was a pleasant surprise. Easy enough to find since it's right on the main road about 800m from the railway station (as you leave the main station exit, walk straight and it's on the left side of the road). The lobby was small but clean and new, while the staff were extremely friendly and helpful. I booked the room on the internet and had no issues whatsoever. Checking in was a breeze and took me all of 3 minutes. Getting out of the elevator, I was a little dismayed to see the condition of the corridors. Really run down, no air-conditioning, dark and looked like a back alley. After going into the room however, my impressions changed dramatically. Only after stepping in did I realize that the Dormy Inn is not a hotel but are serviced apartments. For the price of a single room, what I got what a full aparment! Living room, study room, master bedroom and a full kitchen with all appliances, crockery, cutlery, washing machine and even a special kimchee fridge! Everything was new, clean and in perfect condition. Free internet connection was also provided via a specially provided LAN cable (no wifi and you cannot use your own LAN cable. If you don't have a computer, there is one in the lobby that is free to use). While my hotel booking said that breakfast was not included, it's actually provided free for all guests from 7am - 9:30am every morning. It's a basic but very decent spread. If you need anything, there is a convenience store right outside. For meals and nightlife, take the back exit (through the small car park) and you'll have bars and restaurants lining the road all the way back to the train station. You'll be spoilt for choice. All in all, a most pleasant stay. If ever I do go back to Suwon, this is definitely the place I'll be staying at!