Hotel Ella — Attraction in Austin

I booked Hotel Ella for my wedding night on August 9th, purchasing all available upgrades through their email promotion. The initial check-in at 3:30 PM went smoothly - I informed the front desk staff this was our wedding night and left our bags before departing for our ceremony.||The Problems Started Upon Our Return (11:15 PM):||• Paid upgrades not delivered - No charcuterie board or cocktail kit despite paying extra||• Broken air conditioning - Room temperature reached 80+ degrees||• No valet parking available as advertised||The Real Issue - Shocking Staff Conduct:||When I politely inquired about the missing amenities I had paid for, the night clerk "Drew" responded sarcastically: "Great, I am so excited to have to deal with this with you tonight." Instead of attempting to resolve the situation or provide alternatives, he immediately offered only refunds.||Despite repeatedly explaining this was our wedding night and asking for reasonable accommodation, Drew became increasingly hostile - pacing behind the desk, waving his fingers in my face, and displaying threatening body language. I felt unsafe and concerned for my new wife.||Management Response - Completely Unhinged:||After waiting a week for any response, General Manager Daniel West's initial reply was a single dismissive sentence. When I expressed disappointment at the lack of even an apology, his follow-up email was shocking:||• Made personal attacks on my character and marriage||• Expressed "sympathy for my wife having to deal with me"||• Threatened to involve police over a customer service complaint||• Banned me from the property for reporting legitimate service failures||• Ended with condescending advice to "reflect internally"||This response crossed every line of professional conduct. Rather than addressing paid services that weren't delivered, management chose personal attacks and intimidation.||Bottom Line:||This was supposed to be one of the most special nights of our lives. Instead, we were forced to leave at midnight and scramble to find alternative accommodations. The combination of service failures, hostile staff conduct, and management's complete lack of accountability makes this unsuitable for any important occasion.||For couples considering Hotel Ella for special events: Look elsewhere. The risk of having your celebration ruined by unprofessional staff and indifferent management isn't worth it.||We ended up at The Otis Hotel, where the staff immediately accommodated us despite the late hour - a stark contrast to Hotel...

The outside of the hotel looked like a dream. Like something Gatsby might’ve built if he’d had spent more time in the antebellum south. The staff smiled like they meant it, which is rare. So far, so good.

Then I opened the door to my “mansion” room. The quotation marks are doing the heavy lifting here. The furniture looked like it had been rescued from a discount bin at a store that had already gone out of business. The carpet smelled like wet nostalgia. Blue light bulbs too cool for a cosy evening. A close hanger was in the middle of the space leaning like it had been through some things. Bent. Crooked. Defeated.

The bottled water had discount branding. Just a basic sticker to reassure you it wasn’t poison and that you could have gotten better stuff at the gas station. The tub was one of those shallow ones, the kind you give up on before the water even hits your ankles. Suicide-proof, probably. Hope-proof, definitely. The shower spout was broken, too. Nothing tragic. Just annoying, like being slowly nibbled to death by ducks.

The lobby was full of boxes — a whole welcome party of cardboard. The tiny hallway to the elevator looked like it had been annexed by storage and shuffling through there to get to the elevator labeled “Mansion Elevator” was comical. I’m not sure if it was under renovation or just giving up.

Breakfast. Ah. The espresso tasted like burnt. The breakfast tacos were made with store-bought tortillas with up charge options for basics. No cheese. No love. And tastes soapy. The staff moved like they were waiting for something better to happen — somewhere else.

The only thing worth admiring was the architecture, and that didn’t have to try very hard. Everything else? Outclassed by your average airport Marriott.

Would I stay again? Maybe under new management or a complete renovation & chef change. I hate to be harsh here, I fully respect the difficulty of the industry, but for the price I was hoping for a lovely jaunt to Austin in a “mansion” and was left with a dumpy little couple of nights dreaming of a proper shower head and a robe or something to waddle around in and play...

I had the misfortune of being put in Room 101 for a work trip. For $373 ($319 before taxes, fees, etc), it was a terrible experience for a "premier king". First, it is the first room as you enter the "room" section of the hotel, which fair enough, some room has to be there, but bteter soundproofing of doors etc. would be nice. In 101, your window faces the valet, and you definitely hear the street noise and all the folk who linger by the entrance to the building.

Moving on to the room itself, the redeeming feature is that the bed is comfortable. Outside of that however, the bathroom light flickers (the left one of the 3 to be specific), the carpet is an extremely old motel style moldy gray look, and the bathroom door can either be shut, or slam into the sink. Did I mention how definitely not quiet this room is?

And as for parking, it is valet-only. When I arrived, I said I was a hotel guest that would be staying overnight. The next morning, I asked about pickup process in the afternoon, and the valet was pretty friendly and said that while he wouldn't be on for the shift, but generally they'd be pulling the cars from a garage not too far away.

Once I got my car, it was covered in bird poop and oak pollen. The new valet said that dailies usually are parked across the street...outside. Except I was an overnight guest so they just plopped my car outside overnight. The valet did try to wipe the biggest poop patch off, but it was caked on pretty good. For whatever reason there was also pollen on the passenger seat and floor, and in general there was more dirt and grime in strange places like the back rear. The steering wheel was also extremely grimey with a hard tissue wipe getting some but not all of the sticky gray stuff off.

So yeah...with parking included it came out to roughly $425 for a 1 night stay (arrived 3pm, checked out at noon, and then conference to 5pm). The staff while friendly could certainly not make up for how not worth the entire...