Villa Florentine

Great location and facilities. Have stayed a number of times and will stay again. It's a great half way stop when travelling from Calais to the South of France. Highly recommend.

Issue with room and lack of follow up. Suite had technical issue that couldn’t be fixed, and no acknowledgment of it was made during check out

There have been occasions where my perception of a thing is so vastly different than other people's I wonder if I'm missing something. This was one of them. I did extensive research before booking my Lyon hotel and was so excited to stay here, a 5 star Relais & Chateaux property which I booked through the hotel website so as to avoid any shenanigans. First impression: everyone was welcoming and pleasant. However, when I got to my room, an "upgraded" junior suite in the annex, disappointment set in. There was no view from the room, it was a long walk and isolated from the actual hotel, which made me feel very alone and nervous, and the bathroom looked like it hadn't been updated since the 1980s. I requested a new room and was put into another junior suite (allegedly also an "upgrade") in the main building. Where to begin - although the view from the room was spectacular, I couldn't really enjoy it because when I opened the windows swarms of bugs came in and set up residence on the ceiling in the room. The room itself looked nothing like the pictures on the website. The furniture looked like a set from the 1980s that a college student might buy on Facebook Marketplace for $75 to furnish their first apartment. And not only was the furniture cheap looking, but it was also all scuffed up. The room seemed oddly empty because the furniture was flimsy and far too small and inconsequential for the space, and there was almost no decor on the walls. The decor consisted of (you guessed it) cheap looking lamps, a mirror, and a single, sad painting above the couch. The drapes were old and kind of dirty. I've included pictures, which I never do in reviews, because I was frankly shocked that this was what they were passing off as a $500+ a night room. This bathroom at least looked like it was updated in the early 2000s rather than the 1980s so progress I guess, but there was black mold in the shower. The bed wasn't particularly comfortable (I've stayed in 3-stars with much more comfortable beds) and one night I was awoken by music that lasted until 4 a.m. that the windows did nothing to block out. A "5 star hotel" should have soundproof windows. Perhaps even more egregiously as someone who needs a cold room to sleep, the AC will only cool the room by up to 3 degrees. This was ok since I was there in May and it hadn't yet gotten warm, but would be miserable in the summer. Nothing about the room felt luxurious - in fact, just the opposite. This is what you would expect of a much cheaper motel. Needless to say, I hated the room and the hotel so much I spent as little time as possible there, and left for the airport several hours early. It was an incredibly disappointing experience for such an expensive stay.