We ended our Arizona visit with a stay at the Westin Phoenix Downtown (@WestinPhoenix @SPG). We arrived around 17h00 on Saturday night and downtown Phoenix was as dead as can be. We parked across the street and walked (in the blazing heat) to the hotel. The lobby was empty, except for three Westin employees, two of which scattered when we entered the lobby.
The man working reception was very nice and thanked me for my loyalty (Gold status). We made small talk while he typed away for quite a while on his computer. Have you ever wondered what the hell they are typing during check-in? I asked about the occupancy level at the hotel and he said they were well below 15% and it was so dead. Of course, this encouraged me to ask about a room upgrade – which was immediately met with “No, we have no upgrades available.” Hmmmm. Upgrades aren’t guaranteed, so I can’t really complain.
We were given a room on the 16th floor. The hotel really seemed like a ghost town. When I opened the door to the room I was shocked at the rush of cold air hitting me — such a huge (and wonderful) difference compared to the
Aloft from a few days earlier.
Entering the room you immediately come across the bathroom, which was quite modern and except the two burned out lights (I called the front desk and this was remedied immediately) the bathroom was pretty nice. I like the design aesthetic and the hotel is only 2 years old so it is still quite clean (and considering it is in Phoenix, I doubt the summers are all that busy here, reducing the number of guests even more).
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Door-less toilet alcove. |
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Great walk-in shower and modern vanity |
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Mini-Fridge, safe and coffee maker in closet. |
When we walked into the room itself, we were quite surprised at the size. This room was huge, with a couch, a chair, a desk, along with a king sized bed and a bench. My first thought was how I wanted to see what an upgraded room would be like. Honestly, there was a lot of wasted space in this room — I’m not complaining – I like the space and could see myself getting a lot of work done and having ample space to relax on a future stay.
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Main area of standard room |
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Main area |
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Seating area |
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View from the room |
As you all know one of my biggest hotel pet peeves is a total lack of electrical outlets near the bed. This hotel did a pretty good job of having outlets — the biggest problem? The outlets were laid out so that your standard mobile device chargers could be plugged in (they were too big and the outlet was at the very bottom of the lamp base).

The hotel itself was actually quite nice — and the restaurant Province was good too (we just had appetizers and some cocktails only). We didn’t have much interaction with the hotel staff at all, other than check-in and check-out (and the quick help from maintenance when they replaced our bathroom light bulbs), but all in all, I thought the stay was pretty good.
Since it was early July, we were able to get a very good rate and the location seemed pretty good too – we walked around the corner to grab dinner with a friend in Phoenix and we passed by several restaurants that looked like they had some decent selections. I would definitely give this property another go if I were staying in downtown Phoenix again.
Have you stayed here before? What is your favorite Starwood property in Phoenix? Does it surprise you how dead downtown Phoenix is on a weekend as much as it did me?Be the first to know when a new post is published: sign up to receive them via email or directly in your RSS Reader. Follow me on Twitter or Google Plus too!
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