Soho Sanctum Hotel, London

You'd imagine a hotel owned by the management of the rock group Iron Maiden is going to be a bit different and the Soho Sanctum doesn't disappoint. With a basement boutique cinema and a really cool rooftop garden/lounge/bar- including hot tub - as part of the offering, it's a hotel with celebrities in mind.

I pretty much took the place over for a launch event, which meant I ended up in one of the loft suites, which go for around £400 per night. Comfortable, nicely designed, high quality of furnishings and fitments, the room was nice - however I wasn't blown away. There just seemed to be something lacking and I just couldn't put my finger on what. It had a stunning stand along hot tub nearby the bed, a disappointingly small bathroom for a room of this cost, a cool speaker which housed the mini-bar and a large, comfortable, king-size bed. Lot's of plus points, however the sum part of them all, didn't add up to something bigger if that makes sense.

The room was located the other side of the door into the rooftop lounge, which was great for accessing my event, however I'm sure it would be noisy if you had booked the room and a function went on a bit late, next door. I had a good look round all the rooms on a pre-inspection visit, they are a mix of crash pads and larger rooms, some with a heavy boudoir theme to them, which may not appeal to everyone, so check before you book.

Staff are welcoming and the intimate reception area, gives a nice feel to the place. The restaurant/bar is combined with the restaurant occupying the bulk of the available space, to accomodate all the Soho luvvies who'll be stopping by for lunch/dinner. It didn't feel like somewhere you could sit all night working on your laptop whilst having a beer, I guess the roof garden is where that should be at, providing there isn't a function on (again check before you book as access is limited).

Location wise, it's very good for the West End, being only a stones throw from Piccadilly Circus and Regent Street. Ideal for London meetings or sightseeing.

My Rating - 4P's. Mainly due to not feeling the WOW appeal from the room that I was hoping for. It's a great hotel, well worth a visit to make your own judgment and to have a beer or two in the roof garden and see if you can spot a celeb.

Dean Street Townhouse Hotel, Soho

Bang, smack in the centre of London's Soho, the Dean Street Townhouse is one of the best located hotels you can stop in if you want to be in the beating heart of Soho, close to the bars and restaurants.

When you eventually track it down, as it's not particularly obvious it's a hotel (I wandered in to the next door restaurant first), you'll be greeted by a small and intimate reception and public seating area. The hotel is about intimacy, combined with a comfortable, individually designed room. Fittings were of a high quality, i-Pod dock, Roberts DAB radio, LCD screen, nice toiletries, rain shower, bed linen etc. A bit of a home from home.

Prices range from around £140 upwards for a small room, escalating to around £290 if you look at their website. If you want to save on taxi's and be centrally located for Oxford Street, Soho and the West End generally, it's well worth considering.

My Rating 4P's.

Citizen M - Glasgow

What strikes you on arrival at Citizen M, is the informality of the place. There isn't the usual thirty foot long reception desk, but a bank of check-in screens, like at an airport, where greeters will help get you checked in quickly. It's the first sign, that the hotel operates slightly differently,that they've thought about their audience and the way their lives work.

The hotel is really well thought out in its public areas, with a lot of focus on bringing travellers together. The reception/bar/breakfast area/breakout seating areas are all on the same floor and flow as one space, with modern/contemporary furniture and workstations, which adds to the informality and sense of space.

Rooms are of a high quality for the price, compact but highly functional. They are about twelve foot wide, but about twenty five foot deep. Each room is equipped with a King Size bed which consumes the entire width of the room with a large LCD TV and a Philips Moodpad system which allows you to control pretty much everything in the room . A small open sink is in the room with a shower cubicle (rainshower style)/toilet and a small desk at which to work. For an overnight trip it was more than adequate, if there are two of you - it might feel a bit cramped if you've got luggage.

Close to both Glasgow train stations (about seven to ten minutes walk to both), it's well located for visiting the city. One major drawback is parking. The hotel is on a busy one way-street, with no lay-by to bag drop and the car park is around five minutes walk away. I was in quite a rush when I arrived as I needed to take a train to Edinburgh for a dinner, by the time I'd worked out how it all worked, parked, got back and checked in it added twenty minutes onto a tight schedule, just about made it by the skin of my teeth.

It wouldn't stop me from staying at the hotel again as nearly all city hotels have this problem, would just plan it better next time and ensure luggage is kept to a minimum. The main reason for this is that you have to put it in context of the whole experience versus the price.

My rate was round £90 for the night. This included free wireless internet and free movies in the room, which is standard in the hotel. Having a drink in the bar when I got back from dinner, I found the prices reasonable and the serving sizes really ample. A glass of wine was about twice what you'd normally get in a hotel, for around a fiver a glass. Staff were really friendly and made a point to engage me, seeing I was a lone traveller. It has a nice atmosphere to it, relaxed, informal and not threatening if you're travelling alone.

The Citizen M concept is really refreshing and it seems they have plans to roll it out further across Europe. I think other hotels could learn quite a bit from them, they've taken a fresh sheet of paper to the idea of a hotel, right from the basics up in terms of design and guest experience. I'd go back there and - relative to price - it's a smashing place to stay.

My Rating 5P's

The Arch, London

Opened in December 2009, The Arch, is a new contemporary hotel, just a stone's throw from Marble Arch. Nestling in Great Cumberland Place, it's close enough to the action to feel part of it, but also being on a side street, so the road noise levels are very low.

Set in a row of Georgian townhouses, let me say from the start, that they are getting it right. Great location (close to Hyde Park and Oxford St), beautiful decoration in the public areas, hearty welcome on reception and a really nice feel about the place. It has the wow appeal and you know it's going to be a great stay.

Rooms are really comfortable, with a real attention to detail. Bed linen is of a really high quality, the furniture of a high quality, TV in the bathroom, big fluffy towels (which were replaced during my stay), Sky HD, free wireless internet (that's worth £15 a night), free soft drinks in the mini-bar.

The market for hotels is competitive in London, finding a hotel where you're not just part of the crowd is becoming more difficult. The Arch have struck a really nice balance between attentiveness and anonymity. Rooms can be booked for around £229 a night including breakfast until April, breakfast is of a really high quality with plenty of choice. If your budget runs to this hotel, I'd highly recommend you give it a try.

I'd only have one thing to improve, that was the bar closed at mid-night. Having got back from a function, it's always nice to have a night cap, so you'll need to pop futher down Great Cumberland place for that.

Official Rating - Unknown.

My Rating 5p.

Roomzzz, Manchester

Aparthotel Roomzzz has now opened in Manchester, occupying the building previously known as the Yang Sing Oriental Boutique Hotel which went bust earlier in 2009 (I previously reviewed it here). Roomzzz is in essence an "Aparthotel", that is, it caters more for the traveller that wants to be self-sufficient during their stay, for example, by cooking their own meals. In my view, that tends to be the family market, which this hotel - by nature of it's design/decoration - isn't suited to. As with the previous Yang Sing, reception is located in the basement and if you're dropping bags off in your car, it is difficult with the hotel being located by a major set of traffic lights with double yellow lines on and no pull in bay of any kind. Reception is nicely decorated, very contemporary and gives a good opening account of the hotel along with the pleasant reception staff. Rooms are spread across five floors, we stayed in room 406 (a Grande Studio) on the fourth floor overlooking Princess Street, with the advantage being it's a bit quieter for the traffic noise, which can be substantial given the hotels location. The room was well laid out, had a lovely bathroom (albeit with leaking bath and a shower curtain - rather than screen) with an integrated TV which you could watch whilst having a soak in the bath . With the hotel previously being a top of the range boutique hotel, you quickly notice that some of the fixtures and fittings are of top quality (like the bath TV) and others aren't, with the new owners re-fitting it to their spec which is more cost conscious (desks and wardrobes). Also worthy of note is that most rooms only have a shower, bath's are by special request. Each room has it's own mini-kitchen, which did feel rather strange in a boutique style hotel and the units looked quite out of place in the rooms. Nevertheless, if you want to cook your own food, you'll find they have everything you need. For the business traveller, you get free wireless, a work station (which was too small in my view) and i-mac in each room, a couple of bottles of small mineral water I think would be a good addition. The LG LCD TV took some figuring out, only by having the same model at home was I able to get some channels going, so I'm sure this will mean quite a few calls to reception by guests staying. Staying on the subject of being a business traveller, for me, when I stay at a hotel on business I generally like to sit in a bar during the evening and do a bit of work or eat in the hotel restaurant in order to feel not quite as isolated. Roomzzz has neither, so if you prefer that things yourself, Roomzzz won't be for you. They sell food at reception, but not alcohol if you fancy a beer in your room whilst working, which seems really strange. Breakfast is a concept called "grab and go" which basically means some croissants, fruit and pastries in reception with a coffee machine (pastries I grabbed were stale). It won't suit everyone, especially if you need to set yourself up for the day and it was missing some carry bags or other method - other than a napkin - of getting it back to your room. I think they'd be better to just deliver this to the room in bags hung on your door, like other hotels I've stayed in. Bed was comfortable. The room had a free safe (albeit it was right at the bottom of the wardrobe, which means hands and feet to lock it) and the quality of the room overall was to expectation with high ceilings and some exposed beams, which makes it stand out from the lifeless chain hotels that you often stay in. The standard rooms called Smart Studios seemed comfortable, although some seemed quite basic and a little cold. One other thing not to forget is that you will be charged car parking, the closest car park is the Q-park a couple of streets up from Roomzzz, overnight will cost you around £18, so it's important to factor this into your budget, they do offer at 25% discount at NCP but the staff seemed a little unsure on how to get this. On the plus side, most other hotels in Manchester don't have parking and the wireless internet is free, which you can offset the parking cost against. The key thing to remember is that it is more about renting an apartment for the night and there are very few "hotel facilities", so if you want a bar and a restaurant, stay somewhere else such as The Radisson Edwardian. I would always pay the difference and go for a Grande Studio if it were me which you can get for around £99 per night, midweek. The hotel doesn't have an official star rating, so I'd put the rooms around 4P and the facilities at 3P, given that they don't really offer much. Overall, I think the Roomzzz aparthotel will be good value if you can get the right rate, breakfast is unimportant and you're eating out or don't mind preparing your own food.

Hoxton Hotel, London E1.

Sat in the heart of Hoxton, the uber cool area of E1, the Hoxton Hotel has been open around 3 years. It was my first stay. Public areas are lovely, really cool, nicely designed and a real feeling of spaciousness. At night, it came alive with lots of diners, people having drinks and talking. Checking in, I felt the front desk could have done better, all my attempts at starting a conversation were cut pretty well dead. It felt very cold and matter of fact, one of the basics that so many hotels get wrong. Everyone is dressed very casually, part of the overall "image" of the hotel and that contributes to the look/feel the hotel is trying to create. My room (number 624) was at the end of a corridor and looked out onto the back of an office block where they could see right into the room (I pulled the curtains over most of the time). Overall it was comfortable enough, however I felt it lacked a bit of character. Classic concrete coloured wall, wenge coloured furniture and fittings. Bathroom was modern, with shower (no bath) and Aveda toiletries, my shower leaked which flooded the bathroom floor (I reported it the following morning, so will no doubt be sorted). Plus points are free wireless, free safe and the cute breakfast bag that you hang outside your door for the morning. I hired a meeting room too, which I found to be really good. No noise. Good facilities and plenty of refreshments on hand whenever you want them. Parking is a bit of a challenge, outside the hotel is a red zone, so you'll need to go round the back if dropping off. Tube wise, Old Street is only a short walk away. There are plenty of nice restaurants around the hotel, I booked a table at The Rivington Grill round the corner, which was really nice, no real complaints other than the "non personality" staff, that's London for you. Overall the Hoxton Hotel is a nice hotel, they've thought through conceptually what they stand for, the public areas are lovely and the rooms comfortable. I liked their quirky signs in the room, the bills that said "here's the damage" at the top. If they sort the welcome out, I'd go back.

Official Rating 5*

My Rating 4P

De Vere Grand Harbour Hotel, Southampton

Stayed in an executive room here for a conference, I wouldn't go back. The hotel is tired and the room was hot. On the positive side it was reasonably close for the ships/shops and the bed was comfortable. Breakfast was OK and the food during the conference was of a good standard.

Official Rating 4*

My rating - 3P