The St. Regis Hotel near the Galleria better watch out — the TigerHawk is not pleased.
TigerHawk and other business travelers, next time that you need to stay in that area of Houston, I recommend either The Omni Hotel off of Woodway (which has high speed internet access in all of its rooms) or The Houstonian, but note that the Houstonian has high speed internet access in only their third and fourth floor rooms. Both are better bets than the St. Regis.
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Now, Tom, I’m gonna have to go ahead and disagree with you there.
Confession: I got married at the St. Regis six months ago, so I’m a little biased, but I’ve stayed at all 3 of the hotels you mentioned (including a non-marital stay at the St. Regis), and there is no way the Omni or the Houstonian are nicer than the St. Regis.
High-speed internet being down is annoying, but hey, that happens everywhere. I’m not sure why TigerHawk assumes there should be wireless internet available in the hotel. That technology is not widespread even in business hotels. I seriously doubt either the Omni or the Houstonian has it, but I admit I could be wrong.
The Remington, the restaurant at the St. Regis, is a much, much better bet than either the restaurant at the Houstonian or the Omni (I think the food at the former is poor for an ostensibly nice hotel), and the Victorian sensibilities of the Regis are more elegant and more distinctive than either of the others.
I have never stayed in any hotel where I found the staff as courteous and responsive as at the St. Regis.
Maybe TigerHawk had a bad experience, but I’d encourage him to visit again.
TP, I agree that the St. Regis is a quality hotel, particularly for the leisure traveler. But for a business traveler, its lack of consistent high-speed internet access is frankly inexplicable in this day and age. Both the Omni and the Houstonian have it. I agree generally with your analysis of the respective restaurants, although I think the Omni’s is as good as the Remington.
The sheets were nice, the furniture was nice, but the Internet access was down. Note that I do not care whether it is wireless or not — I was happy to work tethered to the wall. Also, there is no little coffee pot in the room, which is hugely disappointing when you pop awake at 4:30 in the morning (which is what I did, since it my normal wake-up time is 5:30 EST). A Courtyard Marriott has free Internet access and coffee in the room at half the price of the St. Regis.
So there you have it.
(TigerHawk)