Saturday, March 14, 2015

St Regis - Hotel Staycation Review

St Regis - Hotel Staycation Review

Here's how our experience at St Regis went:

We had requested for early check in and I called St Regis before coming down to check if the room was ready. The staff told me that we could check-in around 12pm so we had lunch before driving down to the hotel.

St Regis is located at Tanglin Road (near to Forum shopping mall), we had driven past many times so we didnt have trouble finding the hotel.


First impression of the hotel was that the lobby was pretty nice and there was a grand looking restaurant. There wasn't any nice hotel scent though (unlike when you step into hotels like Shangri La and Four Seasons) which was surprising given that St Regis is a 6 star hotel.


At the check-in counter, we approached one of the 3 counters and this lady served us. 

I was expecting a more warm welcome and thought the check-in staff would explain about the butler service (which is supposed to be main selling point/highlight of staying at St Regis) but she just informed us that our rate did not include breakfast and tried to sell us their breakfast package for $120++ (and even put her name on card with details of the breakfast package, not sure why. Maybe she gets commission from this..) When she saw that we were not interested, she was in a hurry to complete the check-in process and passed us our room card keys.


Here we come!


We were given a room on the 10th floor. The highest floor is 20 i think?

Executive Deluxe room




This was our room - the room was very tastefully decorated



 There was a comfy big sofa in the room and there was still lots of space to walk around




Me and Kelvin ;D

I had read from other blog reviews that their bathroom was nice and the bathroom certainly did not disappoint.


TV in the bath tub  -  I like! The only other hotel where there was a tv in the room was in Vegas when we stayed at the Wynn hotel.


2 huge double sinks


Bathroom amenities - Remede (supposed to be exclusively available only at St Regis)

The shampoo was ok but the conditioner wasnt very good. My hair felt pretty rough even after putting lots of conditioner hmm. I still prefer the branded toiletries brands provided at other hotels which I stayed before (my favourite is still L'Occitane!)


There was a pillow menu (found this hidden in one of the drawers) but we didnt order any special pillows


Complimentary TWG tea 



Butler service - I must admit, i'm really underwhelmed by the so called butler service. Maybe i had my expectations way up there because of all the reviews i saw online :/

I was like expecting a real butler to escort us to our room and to introduce himself and share with us about the butler service (pressing service,complimentary tea/coffee making service etc) as well as room/hotel facilities like the one in the St Regis video I saw on youtube


Reality: There was no butler waiting for us anywhere and i was like thinking hmm maybe i need to let them know we are here so they can tell us abt the butler service... so I pressed the button to request for some coffee and tea.  We waited about  10 to 15 minutes before the butler came. 

I opened the hotel room door when the bell ring and and a St Regis staff (looking rather harried and busy) walked in carrying the coffee and put it down. So i thought ok, he must be our butler and will now introduce himself and our room. oh wait nope, he is walking out of the room quickly. Hmm, ok maybe this butler service is overrated lol.

The cafe latte wasnt too bad though not very hot by then the time the butler brought it to our room..

Artistic pic of my coffee ;D


After that, i had to go off for my IPL session at Musee Platinum so i made my way to Scotts Square. I wanted to walk initially but it was pretty far and the weather was really hot so I ended up taking a bus there lol.

After my appointment, i met Kelvin at Ion to do some shopping as he was looking for a new wallet. After walking around for some time, we decided to go back to the hotel to rest and I wanted to try the spa facilities as well.

Remede Spa

Hotel guests can use the spa facilities - hot sauna and steam bath and pool. The spa was pretty good, when i walked in there was a lady that asked me if I was a hotel guest and showed me around.She passed me a key to the locker.

Inside the locker was a bathrobe, bathroom slippers and I think there was a shower cap as well.


the locker area - looks pretty posh and luxurious doesnt it? 

I had a nice time soaking in the hot tub and tried out the hot sauna room.  They provided lots of towels and bottles of chilled water in the spa.


Overall experience:  The hotel stay was comfortable but the so called butler service is actually just normal housekeeping/room service except you can ask for coffee/tea. They also have a pressing service (which nobody actually informed us about) which you can make use of but i know about it from reviews online and their website.

Plus points - the spa was pretty good.  Also, when i called to ask for a bubble bath soak (as there was only a bath salt inside the bathroom), this staff came in to personally help me make my bubble bath (she spent a good 10 mins or so doing it) and it was awesome! 

Look at all the bubbles ;D


Minus points

The butler service was really very ordinary and nothing great. Nobody introduced us to what the butler service was about, to the hotel facilities and no personalized touch at all despite the bespoke or customized experience the hotel mentioned in their website.

For turn down service, i was expecting some milk and cookies to be placed by the bed (read that from some online blogger who said St Regis did that for her stay) or like some chocs but there was nothing. Again, maybe my expectations were too high and i shouldnt have searched for reviews online before coming haha. Or maybe we need to book a more expensive room type??

Note: I had mentioned in the hotel reservation we were celebrating my birthday for the stay (which we were) and there was NOTHING done by the hotel. Nada. Zilch. How disappointing.. I remember when we booked our wedding anniversary stay at Four Seasons, the service was excellent. They upgraded us to a nicer room on the couple's floor and even gave us a complimentary cake to celebrate our wedding anniversary.

Kelvin also mentioned that he preferred staying at Four Seasons and that the service was much better there.  
So in summary, I reckon its not worth splurging on a stay at St Regis Singapore (it came up to S$420 plus without breakfast). I was expecting much better service given St Regis Singapore is a 6 star hotel.  I would recommend to go Four Seasons Singapore instead if you are looking for a nice staycation as their staff are really much warmer/friendlier and the service is much better even without the so called butler service. 

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