In a convenient central location for business and leisure, facing the train station, this dependable midrange hotel is outclassed by the Meridien yet is a better overall choice than the Jolly hotels in the city. Still, for individuals, sibling Grand Hotel Sitea offers superior service and more intimate surroundings, with a better staff and better-maintained guest rooms. Groups and gatherings love this place for its fair rates, spacious public areas and large guest rooms, but it is looking worn around the edges and in need of renovations.
An affable offspring of Italy's homegrown Turin Hotels International chain, this well-run property benefits from competent management and a staff that is serious about its job. Compared with some of its siblings, San Clemente Palace in Venice and San Domenico Palace in Sicily, this hotel is hardly a standout, but in staid starched Turin, its unpretentious traditional ambience makes it one of the best choices.
The entrance to the classic six-story building is through an attractive portico framed by two trees. The hotel first entertained guests in 1872, and the public areas display plenty of restored features from its heyday. The spacious period lobby is fitted with thin velour armchairs on area rugs and glistening travertine. Oriental vases and flowers add color. Tall draped windows in back offer a view of Neptune in stone against a leafy backdrop. Low-slung rattan chairs, sofas and stools in a rust-red setting conjure up the Orient.
The restaurant, Vigna Real, offers up better food than decor, the latter more resembling a clumsily fitted meeting room than a notable dining room. Service, too, surpasses the room's tepid style.
The meeting facilities provide state-of-the-art audiovisual equipment and wireless Internet access. The florid ballroom can accommodate 200 people theater-style. The hotel has a garage, and small pets are permitted.
The faded traditional-style guest rooms feature aging carpeting and spreads, silk wall coverings, 19th-century French reproductions, and color schemes culled from the primary color wheel—deep blue, red and yellow. The amenity-rich guest quarters boast thermostats, TVs with BBC, phones with data ports, safes and minibars. Marble baths have hair dryers and robes, and each has a shower, tub or both, but some combination tubs lack curtains. The best rooms in Turin for travelers with disabilities are here.
Despite the unglamorous location, this hotel is a reliable choice, although ATA Hotels' new Principi di Piemonte is miles above this place on all accounts. Intimate Villa Sassi proves the top pick for motorists willing to brave Turin's terrible traffic.
