London: W Hotel - Inside & Out

 This is where we stayed - the W Hotel Leicester Square. The room with the red lights is the Wyld club. We think. We never made it there, as we always had too much fun in the W Lounge to even try the other club!

 Here is the exact opposite corner of the building during the day.

 The entrance is the dark area towards the center of the building, on Wardour Street.

 The backside of the building, towards Leicester Square. LS was closed for remodeling while we were there, probably prepping for the 2012 Olympics.

 Once we entered the building, we checked in at the lobby, on the 2nd floor.

 The elevators were very nice...

 Up we went to the 4th floor...

 We should say that the staff at the hotel - checkin, W Lounge, room service - were all first rate. We've never had better service and would highly recommend a stay here to anyone who likes a modern, lively atmosphere. Our stay was phenomenal.

 Upon exiting the elevator, the 4th floor lobby was just as intriguing.

 The hallway towards our room. And yes it was this dark!

 Room numbers looked like beacons of light!

The uniqueness of the architecture made the hotel visible from blocks away. I'm standing close to Picadilly Circus when taking this photo.

London: W Hotel - Our Room

 Let's take a look around our room at the W Hotel Leicester Square in London! Here is what it looked like when we first entered the room and dropped our luggage.

 We reserved a Spectacular Room (that's what they call it) which is just a Wonderful Room except on an upper floor. We purposely did that because the W Hotel has an awesome nightclub, and we wanted to avoid being kept up at night. This shows the TV, small couch, and bed.

 One unusual feature of the room is that the sink and countertop are not in the bathroom - they are in the center of the main area.

Here is the courtesy bar.

 The TV was very nice, but the music video they showed by default was very bizarre. It was ingrained in my brain for weeks.

 In an 8 story hotel, apparently the 4th floor is considered an upper floor, because that's where this room was located. Remember, the 4th floor would be called the 5th floor in the US, since Europe starts numbering their floors with 0.

 The alarm clock at bedside.

 There were Angus Steak Houses every two blocks or so in London. Alllll over the place!

 Looking back towards the door. See the gray panel? It slides right over the entrance to expose the closet. It is actually a very cool feature as it gives guests double-protection against hallway noise. In fact, we never heard a peep from the hallway.

 The glass area covers two cubes - one is the toilet, the other is the shower. The shower has the semi-opaque wall to let light in from the window.

 Another angle showing the center island. Luggage ended up in the corner as the closet was not big enough to hold it.

 Books that were supplied with the room.

 The plate display.

 The closet area that contained a safe. The safe worked even with the electricity out. We know, because the electricity went out twice while we were there! Once during checkout, when I was worried about getting objects out of it. It worked out fine.

 In fact, the staff was extremely helpful each time the electricity went out. They were there with flashlights to show us to our room (hallways were pitch black!) and supplied us with free water. And since it was out while we checked out, they hauled our heavy luggage down five flights of stairs for us! We didn't ask, they insisted.

 The toilet stall. I don't know what idiot didn't put the seat down before taking a photo. :-)

 Shower. One design flaw is that the water from the shower seeped a bit onto the floor of the main room. Not serious, but annoying.

 The shower area, with the mini-bar showing through the other side.

 The thermostat controls. Easy to understand and use. Except I have to start remembering to bring a celsius to fahrenheit conversion chart to Europe.

 As with many European hotels, we had to slide our room key into this wall slot to get the room electricity to work. Was the room as advertised? You tell us after looking at their website!

 The layout of the hotel.

 The bed was very comfortable, which is should be since the hotel was only 3 or 4 months old at this point.

 Trying to tell the guests to not blow their top?

 The view of Wardour Street from our room.

  The phone on the other side.

 On that island with the sink are the controls shown, though we never used any of them except the electrical plug (curling iron, blow dryer).

 Must've been about bedtime, as there is a glass of wine!

 A random shot I took of McDonald's patrons.

Outlets along the right side of the bed.

 And the view at night. Now, even on the 5th (4th) floor, we could hear the thump thump of the club on the 2nd (1st) floor, but it was very muted and did not keep us up at all. We theorize we could hear it because the building is encased in glass, which probably reverberated the sound upward. But it did not affect our enjoyment of the room a bit.

The room with the lights out. Goodnight, all.