Muir, a Luxury Collection Hotel, Halifax — Hotel in Halifax

This is the only 5 Star hotel in Halifax located at the prestigious Queen's Marque down by the waterfront. And I have to say that the service staff is very good and the rooms are modern and eye catching. There is a Muir Range Rover service that will transport you anywhere you wish to go within a 2 KM radius which is nice. And you can rent a yacht ( 2 Sizes Available ) along with a power boat for private tours. You can book the Muir’s 36-foot Morris yacht, where we got a rare perspective of the much-loved coastline. You can book a 2 or 4 hour tour and you can choose food from a curated picnic menu. Wi-Fi is included and it is lightening fast. Luxury brand Aesop is used and offered in the washroom for skin and body care.

Like I said before, the service and the services are quite exceptional. But, I have to admit that the little things that popped up made my experience to be less than 5 Star. I had booked 3 rooms. All were the Muir's Signature Queen's Rooms for a 7 day stay. All of these rooms were guaranteed a ocean / water view. But I found the location of our rooms to be quite lacking especially at these prices. Our rooms were closer to Lower Water street than the boardwalk. My family spent $12K+ for three rooms with a view of the rooftop of the adjacent Maritime Museum for a week....gee thanks...One of the rooms had a slow water leak in the in room refrigerator along with a flickering light bulb on its last legs on the reading lamp next to the reading chair and ottoman. In my room, the AC vent began to rattle etc. who bothered me during the night while I was sleeping. And I found the handle on the glass shower door was very loose. Luckily I was able to use a towel for some friction to hold onto one end while tightening the other end...phew...no service call required.

Like I said, it is the small things. What was extremely odd was the inconsistency with the housecleaning staff. What I mean by this is that they would remove the wonderful in room china / tea and coffee sets along with the silverware...but they forgot to replace them. So how am I supposed to enjoy my afternoon tea and coffee? And the in room selection of teas and coffee were not properly replenished. Another odd service quirk is that they would see and take my used bath towels, but they would not replace it with the exact amount. For example, if I used 4 bath towels; they would only replace 2. And the rooms were not properly cleaned, dusted and vacuumed on a daily basis as an FYI.

Therefore all of these service " quirks" required me to call the front desk to rectify. And I had to make a few calls. I have stayed at say 3-4 Star hotels in Dubai, Singapore and Malaysia which offered a better experience I must say. I am not trying to knock The Muir at all.

My family enjoyed our stay here but they should do better because people will EXPECT BETTER at these prices. However, we will be just a bit hesitant to choose this location again. So please do give them a try if you are in the Halifax area and then let us all know what your thoughts are. Safe travels...

It may be because it's new but the service/experience was not fitting for a luxury hotel.

The good: Front desk, valet, and room staff and room attendants were all lovely. Finishes throughout the hotel are beautiful.

The bad: We made our way to the spa reception area and didn't see any pool-specific signage. It surprised me that with two employees conversing with one another in the reception area that I needed to interject and ask for directions. Apparently only one of the valet staff can drive a manual and they were offsite when I needed my vehicle in the evening. While they were kind and apologetic and refunded my valet charge, I can't picture myself having to go into the valet parkade for my own vehicle at the Fairmont Banff Springs as I had to here. It's not a major miss but seems like one that should be somewhat easy to avoid. We attended Drift for breakfast and were disappointed that there wasn't a gluten free menu. For a luxury hotel, I expected more than "uh, I think that's safe but I'll go doublecheck with the kitchen," especially when it's so easy to have a menu or provide servers with a cheat sheet. Further, we were not checked on throughout our meal - we finished our meal without condiments and our coffee wasn't refilled until our meals were finished and the bill was on the way. I get better service than this in diners where the cost is far less than $60.

Lastly, while the finishes are beautiful, there are some headscratching decisions as it pertains to design, namely the shower walls. While it's mostly frosted (until the top where the light is), the wall between the shower and sleeping area is glass. Despite being awake a full two hours before my wife, I couldn't shower and begin my day without the bright light shining onto the bed. Having to choose between getting ready and waking my wife is not a luxury experience and would be a legitimate reason for me to choose another hotel for my next stay. This would be especially so on business trips where one person may be heading to meetings while the other relaxes as a plus one.

In closing, while most of the staff were wonderful to speak with and the hotel was beautiful, it's hard to get excited about poor restaurant waitstaff, having to retrieve your own vehicle from valet parking, and a room that doesn't function properly for couples with different morning schedules. It's still a new hotel so I'm sure things will improve with time but I'd have a tough time justifying this hotel for the price in the meantime, especially if I'm not...

I have stayed twice. Once in March, and again this past weekend.

The wellness centre is extremely enjoyable. The steam room and sauna are lovely and the pool is a great temperature. Unfortunately, some of the tiles around the pool have already come loose and some are cracked and shift when you walk over them. The seating area is extremely cramped. No one with a mobility issue would be able to use the loungers. The door leading into the sauna needs repaired as well. They also removed the ladder from the cold plunge pool making it difficult to get out.

During my first stay in March, we became locked in our room. The automatic deadbolt malfunctioned and the door could only be opened from the outside. We had to call the front desk who came and locked themselves in the room with us. He then had to call another staff member to let us out. We then had to switch rooms at 930pm. There was no real explanation as to why this happened, but it made me uncomfortable as I don’t know what would have happened if there had of been an emergency and we weren’t able to get out of our room.

This past weekend I decided to give the hotel another chance and treat my sister and my mother to a weekend at Muir. When we got to our room they had left out cute teapots and different flavours of tea with a kettle. It was a nice gesture. We received turndown service the first night, however no one came the second night. I had to call and ask for water. We also paid $60 to have a third person in our room, however I had to call for a third robe, call for a third bottle of water, call for more towels. I don’t know what the additional cost was for. My biggest issue with this stay, is the fact they charged $80.50 to my credit card at 8pm the day I checked out. When I messaged to inquire why, I was told it was a private bar charge. We had removed some items from the fridge as we had our own beverages and there isn’t any space in the fridge. We set the items in the bar cabinet. Apparently housekeeping doesn’t check to make sure the space is clean for the next guest. Management had to go up and look in the cabinet before they would reverse the charges. Had another guest checked into that room, they would have been able to consume the items out of the fridge at my cost. I would not have been able to dispute the charge.

Overall, generally disappointed in the level of customer service I’ve received during both my stays, especially considering this is a supposed to be a...