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Address – 111 Mary Street, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, 4000. Website.

Contact – Tel: +61 7-3557 8888. Email: westin.brisbane@westin.com.

Location – Located in the city centre near popular attractions like the Botanic Gardens, Queen Street Mall, Queen’s Wharf

Price – AUD333 per night booked directly, with rates jumping to almost double closer to my stay dates. Scary!

Pre-arrival – 5 days prior, I recieved a generic pre-arrival email which is what it is:

On check in day itself, I saw that the app was showing a Suite accorded, yay!

Check In – we arrived via Uber and arrived to an empty lobby at about 4:00pm and was assisted with immediately. It was a rather painless and fuss free process and I took this time to take a quick look around and it was quite a nice cosy modern space.

I was asked for my choice of welcome amentiy – either 1,000 points or restaurant breakfast (otherwise only breakfast at the Westin Club) – it was a no brainer to pick breakfast of course. I was also handed hotel flyer, a welcome letter for Westin Club guests, as well as a box of chocolates with a note. Quite kind of them.

Room – Westin King Suite (60SqM) 1523 was very spacious for 2pax and designed in a cut-out layout which I was okay with when not solo. But first impressions was the dreary dark grey velvety tones which made the 8-year old property feel more aged than it actually is. Some cheery colors certainly will help alot here!

The living area was big enough for 2 ladies to lay out all the staff we brought and bought, set up charging stations, packing area. Bottled water and a rather large fridge was also available here, plus a wet sink.

The cabinet even has cupwares and plates and stuff so the Suite certainly felt more like a serviced apartment than a hotel. At the same time, I thought they could have done more with the space as it felt a little sparse and cold.

Across the hallway was the bedroom area which was unfortunately also had that old velvety vibe but it was at least clean enough. Cute that they place eye masks by the bedside though.

In the middle of these two spaces is the bathroom where I had expected double sinks but oh wells. The toilet was open concept here so no multitasking possible. Toiletries were White Tea which was the typical for the Westin brand.

Finally, the wardrobe in the hallway was as expected – quite nice bedroom slippers though.

Westin Club Lounge (website) –

The Club is accessible using your key cards and located on leve 6, overlooking the pool (so yes you can stone and look at swimmers if you are able to grab a window seat). Seating here is kind of split up by the pillars and half partition design which I quite liked versus just one big space – the 2-seaters by the windows and the family sofa ones were very popular during our visits but otherwise you get regualr dining table-style ones peppered throughout the space too. The bright color tones here was much appreciated versus the vibe in our room.

We only visited for every evening’s 5:00pm – 7:00pm Evening Canapes and Drinks Service – and I have to say the crowd was a healthy bunch with fastest fingers and brimming enthusiasm. Food and drinks went really fast, and the crowd started picking things off the buffet at around the 4:45pm mark.

The food served during these 2 hours are actually quite nice, with a variety of carbs and proteins, and always a handful of cold appetisers alongside cold cuts and cheeses. Some evenings were very Chinese-food centric though but it could suit some palates i guess. I apprecuate that we saw soemthing different each evening and made our 4-nights lif dine-in less boring.

Drinks wise – they had a generous selection of white (types!), ed wines, a rose, and even a sparkling. These are available alongside bottled beers and the usual soft drinks and other non-alcoholic stuff. I was quite happy each evening for sure.

Breakfast – served at Batica on level 1 from 6:30am-10:30am (11:00 on weekends), I liked the ‘woody’ vibe of the space which offers a decent amount of seating with natural lights coming through the large windows. Got crowded 8:30am onwards so probably wise to go early for a peaceful experience.

Food wise, I’ve never seen a large breakfast buffet in Australia hotels and this was no exception. But the small spread was made up of fairly quality offerings including plenty of healthy greens and stuff so I very much appreciated that.

However, we only found out that made-to-order eggs were possible on our 3rd morning, and it was only because we overheard the staff offering it to other guests. We were never offered that since day 1, which we found rather perplexing. Shouldn’t such things be a SOP of sorts? Was this poached eggs with avocado so preciosu they had to throttle the number of guests who it was offered to?

Facilities – I visited the Fitness Centre (24hrs) located on level 5 every morning and found it surprisingly packed at 6:15am every day (!). I guess it was because the space is actually very decent and had good enough equipment.

The Pool located on the same floor (which the gym actually has a view of) was sheltered and looks super pretty at night.

Issues –

SEWAGE SMELL in room – we had quite an unpleasant issue with a sewage smell in our Suite 1523 which we thought was only temporary and asked the housekeeping to come fix. They did by spraying something over the offending drainhole which was located right in the middle of the bathroom. But on the 2nd night, the spray had already gone off and of course the sewage smell was back.

So I called the front desk and housekeeping offered to come fix it again – but I asked them if they can try something else other than repeat the same solution which will then return the issue on night 3, 4 etc. Someone came anyway and incredulously said there is nothing they can do about it other than 1) repeat the same thing 2) cover the hole with a towel. I asked if there is any cleaning liquid they can pour straight into the drainage, and the answer was no again – it was apparently something about them (housekeeping) having no access to open the drainage hole cover, only engineers can do it, and these engineers are not on-site.

Seriously?!

So I went downstairs to the front desk, asked about it, and told the same. They offered a room change which I was very hesitant with as I was already midway through my stay – but I also couldn’t bear the smell any longer. So I asked to check the intended new room to see if that has the same smell, and the Duty Manager offered to go with me. It was then a process of me saying okay to room change, heading back to the room to pack, a staff coming to help with the move, and gave us new keys etc.

I was very happy with the new room BUT I wonder about the logic of offering a room with a sewage smell to a guest in the first place. I mean, did htey think I wouldn’t notice it?! SO DO NOT TAKE ROOM 1523 FOR ANY REASON PLEASE.

Service – housekeeping during out stay seemed very shoddy – we came back to the room one day at 3:00pm to find it still not made up so we called the front desk to inform them to please arrange for 5:00pm in this case as we wanted to rest in the room after a day out, and heading to the Westin Club at 5pm. 5mins later, house keeping came immediately. Haiz.

Also, our tissue box not replenished, the pump-sized toiletries not filled upn after previous guest, and bottled water not replenished. Again, things that should have been SOP but did not happen.

Check Out – fuss free thankfully and I was also asked about my stay and I repeated my sewage smell issue but it didn’t seem much of a concern to the staff so I guessed this was one SOP that finally got carried out albeit with not much love.

In summary,

I actually still like the property (versus Four Points next door) as having access to a Club Lounge made alot of difference for my stay BUT I hope for a Westin they can buck up the shortcomings above and PLEASE FIX THE SEWAGE SMELL ISSUE PLEASE.