MERCURE CASTLE

Lovely hotel, nice staff. Terrible sleep due to reception music being louder in the room that in reception. for the cost of the hotel this was very disappointing.

Fantastic hotel. Great service and staff; breakfast was wonderful. The room was VERY comfortable - the best sleep I've had this entire trip. Good shower too. The location was PERFECT; there were many food choices literally within a block, and the Castle was a five-minute walk away.

Sadly, this is a somewhat negative review. We visited Windsor for a couple of nights and, after looking at the hotel options, I chose the Castle Windsor Hotel. I knew it was nearing the end of its building works when I booked, but I wasn’t sure what was and wasn’t finished. The good news is that our room was. The hotel’s location is perfect, possibly the best spot in Windsor. There’s a large parking area at the rear, and we had no issues finding a space. We stayed in a new Junior Suite on the third floor of the main building. I realise it’s an old building, but the floor in the room was comically slanted. The room itself was large and brand new, but several design choices didn’t seem to have been properly tested from a guest’s perspective. The desk is too high for the chair. Light comes through the top of the curtains, which could easily have been fixed with a top curtain border. The fridge needs better ventilation, as it was not cooling anything and, with the door closed, was red hot. The step up into the bathroom was a little too tall, and we tripped on it at least twice when we forgot it was there. The bedside table on one side was too far away to use properly without getting out of bed. The bed and bedding were fine, but nothing special. The TV also felt too small for its distance from the bed. I had expected a sofa in a Junior Suite, but there were two chairs instead. Given the size of the room (which was large), a sofa at the end of the bed would have made much better use of the space. The hotel itself was totally quiet, with no noise from outside, planes, etc. However, on both mornings, the cleaning staff had loud conversations and banged their trolleys, which woke us up before 8 am. The bathroom was OK, but the bath was too narrow. The shower was also a bit odd. On the plus side, it has one of those drenching, square rain shower heads that still soak you like the ones you sometimes find in spas. Amazing, I love them! The problem is that the shower itself is really too small for it, so the second you put any shampoo or shower gel on, it’s gone. You practically have to stick your head in a corner just to get a breath. It feels as though some of these issues would have been spotted immediately if each room had been test-stayed in before opening. There was no bar or restaurant. To be fair, the room they’d set up for breakfast looked nice, but we didn’t eat there because there are loads of places within walking distance of the hotel. We recommend the shambles wonky house opposite for a light breakfast and great coffee. The internet was excellent at 300 Mbps+. One really silly annoyance was that each day they closed the hotel's front entrance at 6 pm, so you had to use the car park entrance instead. It’s a small thing, but on the first night, ringing the doorbell to get back into the hotel was not particularly welcoming. I realise that at some point you need to close up, but 6 pm seems ridiculously early for a hotel. When we arrived, the reception staff seemed to be dealing with several issues. The woman in front of me appeared to have been waiting quite a while for her room, and there seemed to be quite a lot of apologising going on. My main issue with the stay, though, was the price. I was paying £333 a night, plus £30 a night for parking. At £363 a night, I think it’s reasonable to expect considerably more than the hotel currently offers. The Fairmont isn’t much more per night, although I accept it’s outside Windsor, and that’s a full spa hotel. At this price, the Castle Windsor simply felt like poor value while still under construction and with relatively few facilities available. It left a sour taste and means that, if we return to Windsor, we’ll probably stay somewhere else. Had I paid £150 to £200 a night, I would have said it was a 4 out of 5 and would have happily returned to see the hotel once it was finished.