Relais Villa Vittoria - Antica Dimora - Lake Como — Hotel in Laglio

We had our wedding here in May of 2024 and the experience left a lot to be desired. While the wedding itself was well executed by our planner that we brought with us from the U.S. in conjunction with Laura, the venue's coordinator, the service and hospitality when we arrived at Villa Vittoria fell flat. The wait staff was lovely but the treatment from the front desk staff was disappointing. We spent over a year prepping for the occasion and when we finally arrived to check in, we did not receive the warmest welcome. The ladies at the front desk clearly knew who we were and they could have at least pretended to be excited to see us. Instead, they immediately laid out a piece of paper requesting a card to put on file for 2000 euros to cover incidentals (while we were expecting to cover this, the way they went about it was off-putting). We spent tens of thousands of dollars as we booked every room in the villa for our guests and expected better service. It makes me wonder how the average guest is treated here. Like I said, the wait staff was pleasant, Claudio in particular had a fabulous attitude the entire time!

The first wedding event we held at the villa was our welcome party/rehearsal dinner and we chose to do a pizza party. The pizza party was scheduled to start at 7:30pm but pizzas were not served until well past 8pm and our guests were starving. When the pizzas finally came out, they were being served one by one, so some tables had pizzas while others did not. They did not seem to feel any sense of urgency despite us and our planner asking them why there was a delay. There was also a miscommunication with the food served late night on wedding day. Additionally, we communicated with the venue coordinator that our wedding cake (traditional Italian millefoglie) would be made in front of our guests as entertainment and that did not happen; it was simply brought out already assembled. It's important to note that the wedding meal itself was delicious and our guests loved it (we recommend the linguini with prawns and filet mignon). Our meals outside of the wedding events were also good, like the spaghetti and lobster linguini.

While we chose this villa as our venue for the history and charm, there is definitely some maintenance that could be done to spruce up the place. The prestige suite that we were in did not feel like the nicest room despite it being the biggest, and there are cracks in the walls and other things that could be improved. The robes also had an unpleasant mildew smell and the sinks could have been cleaned better (spots on the faucet). It's been several weeks since we've had the wedding, and we never once received a thank you note or any sort of message from Villa Vittoria. The surrounding area is beautiful and charming (although a quieter town compared to other areas like Menaggio or Bellagio) and the villa does offer several different spaces for events which provides flexibility for those hosting an event here. I appreciate Laura's support throughout the planning process and I hate giving negative feedback, but for any couples choosing this venue for a wedding, I would urge you to over-communicate and clarify every aspect of the contract to avoid any miscommunication...

Before I begin, I want to be clear: I am not the type to leave negative reviews. In fact, I usually take the time only to share positive feedback and highlight what businesses are doing well. Unfortunately, in this case, I feel compelled to offer a constructive review, because our experience at Relais Villa Vittoria in Lake Como was deeply disappointing—and not at all what we expected from a property rated as a four-star hotel.||We arrived before check-in, which we knew was early, but we were told we’d be notified as soon as our room was ready. We decided to wait by the pool with our two children. Unfortunately, the pool area would not serve any lunch or snacks, even though snacks were listed on the menu—they apparently aren’t available until after 6 PM. Our kids were already in their bathing suits, so we couldn’t just head upstairs for lunch due to them being wet and in bathing suits. Eventually, we were told the upstairs restaurant would be closing early due to a wedding, so we rushed up in hopes of grabbing something before it shut down. Only at that point were we told, almost as an afterthought, that our room was ready.||The front desk staff, particularly one woman, was neither helpful nor welcoming. It quickly became apparent that this is not a family-friendly hotel. While the property might market itself as luxurious, it seemed clear that guests with children were not exactly embraced.||When we got to our room, we found multiple issues. There was broken glass on the floor, a damaged TV stand in the second bedroom, a broken mirror stand, and a telescope that couldn’t be used because its brackets were broken. The air conditioning didn’t work despite our repeated requests to have it checked. We were told it was working—but it clearly wasn’t. Thankfully, we were able to sleep with the windows open due to cooler weather at night. The beds were also quite uncomfortable.||The bathroom situation was another disappointment. The “shower” is actually a bathtub with a narrow, glass cylinder partition—making it virtually unusable. My husband, who is 6’4”, couldn’t even fit. On top of that, only one of the showerheads worked; the rest were broken.||But perhaps the most frustrating part of our stay was the hotel’s wedding schedule. What we didn’t realize—and what’s not made very clear upfront—is that Relais Villa Vittoria functions more like a wedding venue with hotel rooms than the other way around. There was a wedding every single night during our stay- let’s call it a wedding carousel. Each one took over the entire property, spanning all three levels, and effectively blocked guests from using the grounds. We were essentially confined to our rooms each evening due to the noise, crowds, and exclusivity of the events. And given the hotel’s fairly remote location, there’s nowhere else convenient to go in the evenings.||On a more positive note, the servers and hotel staff (outside of the front desk) were very kind, and the food was okay—not amazing, but decent.||All in all, we were genuinely excited about staying at this hotel, and we really wanted to love it. But the reality didn’t come close to our expectations. We couldn’t wait to leave and, sadly, we will not...

Location: this hotel is located in Laglio, a gorgeous village on Lake Como. There are plenty of restaurants and activities to do within walking distance of the hotel, and I appreciated that there is a public bus stop just 0.3 miles from the hotel itself.

Room: our room was lovely, decorated in the sweetest way and felt very romantic. The rooms and hotel lobby are very aesthetically pleasing. Our room had a balcony overlooking the lake with plenty of space for a table and two chairs for us to sit out and enjoy the view. The queen sized bed was very comfortable and the bed, floors etc felt clean which I’m very particular about. No visible dust, mold or anything creepy. It’s obvious the hotel could use a refresh (patio furniture by the pool, chair cushions at the restaurant and the pool in general probably need to be replaced, I saw several ripped/tattered chairs and tables on the patio and worn pool grates) but the inside of the room itself was in good shape and none of the furniture, bedding etc in our hotel room itself was worn out or broken.

Activities/Hotel Amenities: this is where this hotel really stood out from the other options. Relais Villa Vitoria offered tons of cool activities right from the hotel which is a huge advantage in Lake Como where it can be really difficult and cumbersome to get around. This hotel offers private boat tours of the lake, photography sessions, cooking lessons, painting lessons, private romantic dinners all for an additional fee but right on site. This was a huge advantage and we had so much fun participating in these activities! Also, the swimming pool is gorgeous with tons of comfy lounge chairs facing the lake and a pool bar open all day where bartenders can make you almost any cocktail you can dream of and charge to your room. The pool was never packed or busy, actually I never saw more than 1 or 2 couples there at a time in August during peak tourist season. It was very quiet and peaceful, the atmosphere was calming and romantic. No noisy partiers or kids and seemed like couples aged 25 - 45 mostly.

This hotel seems to specialize in hosting weddings which was very sweet but I did not realize there would be a wedding every single day even on weekdays. The weddings do take up most of the second patio and overlook the pool area. Something to consider as it can be kind of awkward as a normal hotel guest - I was in my bikini by the pool when a couple was getting married just a few feet above the pool, we could hear most of someone’s wedding ceremony. When the wedding party moved to overlook the pool we headed inside to avoid disrupting their party. Obviously some people don’t want to be “wedding crashers” and we did hear cheering until around 10:30pm after each wedding. This didn’t bother us though and brought even more romance to our honeymoon!!

Service: customer service was excellent at the hotel, they responded to my emails to schedule the activities promptly and had everything correct when we arrived. Our room was cleaned and bed made in the morning. Easy to make dinner reservations and they provided an iron for my clothes quickly. I couldn’t ask for any...