JW Marriott Houston by The Galleria — Attraction in Houston

We have typically stayed at the JW Marriott Downtown, which is lovely in generally every single way. The valet staff is great, the door people and bellhops are lovely and so professional, the front desk staff is wonderful, and housekeeping is AMAZING. Literally everyone on staff is warm, welcoming, and it is a delight to stay there.

THIS location is the absolute antithesis of the Downtown location and the lounge is closed because of the "holiday" but more likely because "REASONS" or "CIRCUMSTANCES".

Our seemingly friendly front desk clerk told us she put us in a "newly renovated room on a high floor away from the elevators." We are supposedly in a room that has been recently renovated, however, it is still somehow remarkably shabby. The carpet is stained in places, the cabinetry neither opens nor closes properly, the new bathroom/closet door (you can have one or the other, but not both, by the way) is poorly patched, everything within that closet is poorly fitted to the space, the clearly new toilet paper holder is literally falling off the wall due to poor installation.

Breakfast this morning was a minor disaster. My young son and I waited and waited and waited some more for someone to seat us, and if anyone had actually just acknowledged our existence, I would have been okay with that, but we were largely ignored until a seemingly capable woman swooped in and sat us only to abandon us to what seemed like a completely green waitstaff. My husband joined us and we all went to make our breakfast selections and while we were away from our table another staffer sat some other couple there and we were treated like bizarre interlopers from then on out. I also came very close to feeding our son very bad cantaloupe and when I tried to explain to the staff that it was rancid, another staffer brought another plate of cantaloupe that was also bad. It smelled off and it tasted worse and, no, it's not just because cantaloupe is terrible fruit to begin with, it was legitimately bad. At the end of our meal, a staffer came by to ask if I still wanted my "to-go coffee" (I asked for it to stay about half an hour before) and I refused it because I 1.) did not want to be a bother and 2.) I did not want to wait another half hour to be forgotten about again and 3.) it seemed like a moot point because he then magically produced our check from nowhere. We departed and I then proceeded to buy a too large (I asked for a small she gave me an extra large) coffee for three times the cost of what a small black coffee should have cost and OHMYGOD it was terrible coffee and I have rarely met a coffee that I wouldn't want to mainline, and yes, I did drink that coffee because I was desperate to cling to some semblance of good, but WOW it was remarkably terribly coffee. The start of my day did not go well.

Prior to leaving for the day, we left a nice gratuity for housekeeping (because tip your housekeepers!!!) with a request for extra hand towels and wash cloths. (Hi, I have a young son and my hobbies include attempting to keep him clean!) I have never had issues with this anywhere else; not the shabby hotel in Dearborn or the weird hotel with the shower that clogged and could have flooded our bathroom at the Edinburgh airport and it was never an issue at either the JW Marriott Downtown Houston, the Marriott Marquis in Downtown Houston, or Le Meridien. I just wanted some extra towels and instead, I'm awake and writing this review instead of doing the work I need to be doing or sleeping.

I am completely sympathetic to workers who have left positions because of poor pay and worse treatment by customers. I fully agree that record profits are totally stolen wages. However, if you aren't going to be hospitable to people, maybe don't enter the...

I rarely write reviews for hotel properties, but I feel this one is important. For background, this was my first stay as a platinum elite member. I traveled with a group from work who wanted to stay at another property, but I insisted on staying here because of my new status! Big mistake. A few points right off the bat - the wifi is AWFUL. My entire team had an extremely difficult time trying to do work, so if you have to use WiFi do not stay at this hotel - it's unreliable. Although the hotel states it has bath robes in every room, it does not. I also found several unwashed towels in my bathroom. The heating system does not work - so if it's a cold spell, you should expect to be extremely cold.

My team and I checked in at different times, and disappointedly, as the only person of color (Asian), I was greeted and treated extremely different from the rest of my group. Unlike the rest of my group, I was not greeted by valet or offered help with my bags (although there was someone standing there), I was not told at the front desk about a car service, I was not even told about my platinum benefits and the fact that there was a lounge that I had access to was never disclosed to me. The only difference between my team members and I, besides being the only person with status, was my race - so I felt extremely uncomfortable and unsafe.

When I finally approached the front desk, their response was to brush it under the rug and then repeatedly lie to me insisting instead that I was treated well because they upgraded my room. But in fact, they did not upgrade my room (for the record I never asked for or expected an upgrade). It felt as though this was some weird excuse for the way they treated me and their way of proving I was not treated lesser than the others. However, I was NOT upgraded - I was gaslit. The General Manager of Room Operations emailed me themselves, and said basically "sorry you feel you were treated differently - but we upgraded you". I responded politely again, requesting clarification about the room upgrade because the image I received attached to my room confirmation was exactly the same as the room I was in. Also, I was told I was upgraded to a corner king room, but I had reserved a corner king room. The entire situation of the constant gaslighting and lying to make up for my different treatment instead of taking accountability was extremely uncomfortable and unnerving.

Customer service contacted this property to alert management of this issue, and I responded to the highly inappropriate response from this person about the situation again lying about my room upgrade to weirdly make up for my different treatment, to no avail. Their response was to ignore the situation.

Different treatment between guests, potential racism, lying directly to guests - are all highly unethical actions and not values of Marriott as a brand, so I would recommend not staying at this hotel and paying a bit more for the St. Regis - or staying at a basic Marriott property (this definitely was not up to the standards of other JW Marriotts anyways - very run...

I'm still processing my experience here and I'm just not sure what to think because stuff was kind of all over the place. I came to stay this past weekend with my boyfriend. We were visiting Houston to do a few things for our anniversary. He is a Marriott Gold member, so we thought it would be nice to have a relaxing weekend at a hotel with great service.

I see where people are coming from when they say this doesn't seem like a JW property - it doesn't. It kind of just seems like any other moderately nice Marriott, and I've had much better service at others.

At check-in the girl was extremely bubbly and smiley, but she was pretty scattered. She asked us the same questions more than once, got the last name wrong despite us spelling it for her, and then noted that we were Gold members... before saying that she didn't have any suite upgrades available, but we did have an "upgraded, larger room" on a high floor with a "great view". We were on the 19th floor, but when we got to the room it was pretty clear most of this was just lip service. Typically "larger room" means corner room. This was not. It overlooked the pool, which was honestly appears kind of dirty from above, and it was small. If you don't have an upgrade - DON'T LIE. It's worse than just saying you don't have any upgrades.

Additionally, the valets took our bags, loaded them onto a trolley, and pushed them inside, but left us to take them up and bring the trolley back down, which I thought was weird. At most equivalent properties they do it for you. HOWEVER, overall the valets were very courteous every time we went to get our car.

The room itself was okay, but nothing special. It was obviously renovated and it was attractive enough but did not stand out as a JW room vs a standard room. You could hear a lot of noise, including what sounded like elevators running. The shower was pretty, but small, and nothing you would consider luxurious. I was disappointed with the toiletries they provided.

The breakfast was in line with what I have had at other Marriott properties. Decent variety in their offerings. The first time we went down we went up to the check in counter and the woman there could barely look up to greet us or get us seated. It seemed like she was annoyed to be there and that left a bad taste in my mouth. However, of the two days that we were, there was one girl there who was lovely and exceptionally nice both times, and another woman who waited on us one morning and was very pleasant as well.

I didn't end up going to the gym but I did go look at it and it was very nice with many different machines.

All in all, everything here was so hit and miss. Some stuff was nice, some stuff......