38 St Giles

What a lovely place. Staff friendly and helpful. Really enjoyed the cake on arrival. Great location. Best breakfast so far. Lovely original features in room. Will be definitely returning.

This is a pretty special little boutique hotel in a great, central Norwich location. The room we had (St Giles suite) was beautiful with a great bathroom opening via ornate double doors onto the main room. However, a few fundamental oversights really let what would otherwise be a five star hotelier down. 1) the TV setup was embaressing. I appreciate the design kudos of having an ancient Bang and Olufsen TV in the roof, very stylish. But it sucked. It was wired to some equally ancient Freeview box, both remote were missing battery covers and I had to jangle all the batteries round and go stand by the TV to get a channel change 2) when you run the bath the integrated shower head pisses water all over the floor. The dial was set all the way to tap, but still water runs out of the shower head. Flooded the bathroom nicely 3) shower head in the shower cubicle is in pretty bad shape too, lots of little nozzles missing so water supply is very patchy, and part of the dial is broken off too. 4) no in room fridge Sort these issues out and this would be an amazing suite!

Loved the location-Norwich is such a beautiful City and we felt that we stayed right in the heart of it. Convenient for pubs and restaurants-all within walking distance. If you fancy a short run-you can get round most of he city from there. Breakfast was outstanding and the accommodation felt luxurious.

Warm hospitality and excellent breakfast. Highly recommended.

The website describes a five-star establishment, as does Google Maps. I was informed by text that I would have to let myself in as all the staff lead at leave at 3: 30pm. Reviews describe the staff as making you feel special. I find the fact that they are not even present for a full working day difficult to correlate to that. There was cracked and peeling paint on the walls, the separate toilet was freezing, the smell of fabric conditioner and air freshener overpowering to the point of nausea. I suspect the reason for this was damp, at one point water started falling from the ceiling as the guest above had a shower. This place charges more than most: on a par with other top end establishments in Norwich per night. In such establishments you do not communicate with guests by text that you will not be there to let them in. Given the price being paid, the suggestion of luxury boutique service and a comparison with the Ritz, one would have thought they could muster somebody to be present to ensure that their rather grandiose and self-satisfied aspirations of quality were at least paid lip service. Indeed the attitude towards guests, judging by the response when I ordered breakfast, appears to be that they consider themselves above the client. At any half decent Hotel my breakfast order would have been taken and any extra items above what was agreed in what they considered an adequate breakfast for one with simply be chargeable. The proprietor responded quite differently to this. The attitude would be perfectly acceptable if they were charging £50 a night, but not if they're charging top dollar in the area AND coping with damp AND leaving guests to fend for themselves AND describing themselves as "5 star". To be fair, the proprietor was politely unhelpful, and ironically solicitous again by text after I left as to whether everything has been to my satisfaction.