HOTEL TAVINOS KYOTO — Hotel in Kyoto

Fantastic budget hotel. We only paid $60 per night for the Hollywood style twin room, which was fantastic value. The room was compact but extremely well designed for a small space. There was lots of underbed storage to tuck luggage into when not using to increase floor space. The TV only has an app designed for the hotel, but they had a laundry room page to allow you to remotely see when a washer/dryer was occupied. The design was quirky and cute of all the rooms and the hotel. The shower was spacious and comfortable. Bathroom had adequate space. The lobby had lots of amenities, including cold water, hot water, miso soup packets, breakfast breads in the morning (matcha pastry!), TV with anime playing, a balcony outside, laundry room. The laundry costs 400 yen per 30 min wash (includes detergent, you do not need to add) and 100 yen for 30 minutes of drying (expect at least 1 hr for drying).

The best part of this hotel is the 7-eleven on the first floor. They have a smoothie machine, hot fresh foods, etc. They are open 24/7. They can also ship your luggage. It is a very busy location given that everyone in the hotel goes there. The location of the hotel is fantastic too. The kiyomizu-gojo bus station is right in front of the hotel, which makes it easy to get there from Kyoto station. The bus stop to Kyoto station is across the street which makes it easy to get there from the hotel and take trips to bamboo forest, Fushimi inari, etc. You can also walk to the Kintetsu station (5 mins) to get to Nara. There are local izakayas nearby and 8-15 minutes away is a more active downtown for more food options. You can walk to Kiyomizu-dera from the hotel and to Gion and Nishiki market, though it is a bit farther.

There is no view (faces a building wall) but you can open the shade to allow natural light in (and even open the window slightly). The windows are frosted which adds some privacy. The beds are 2 mattress on an elevated platform with no actual bed frame, so the mattresses slid easily (I recommend they add a grip surface underneath). The blanket was my biggest issue - the comforter was in a duvet but only tied at 2 points so the comforter kept coming out of the duvet and it was uncomfortable. The shower head was also a little broken - it kept facing towards the inside no matter what we did so that was annoying. The hotel does not ship luggage for you, but the 7-eleven downstairs does. However they didn't speak the best English and the employee who helped me did not know what I needed to put on the slip. I wish the hotel would ship luggage...

This was almost the perfect tourist hotel. Pluses balance out minuses to pull it back up to a 4 star rating. Let's get the minuses out of the way first; the room had a mildewy smell that would have been easy to address with spray, so why not do so? And a major demerit for not having blackout curtains! Are you serious, a hotel with international travelers that doesn't block out light...kinda shocking, but we got over it. Now let's move on to the good stuff. There are staff around, but it's largely self-service, which is convenient. We arrived early and put our huge luggage into an elevator storage thing that was free. Perfect. We came back later to check in- the hotel is right at the bus stop and 1 block from the subway. Luckily we checked in exactly at 3pm, because we got to choose our room from what remained on the floor map, and some rooms are significantly bigger for the same price. Room was "spacious" (for Japan, ie small without being miniscule) with working AC, essential in Kyoto in July. Good design lets you put your suitcases under the bed, but you do have to climb into your bed from the foot as opposed to the side, so if you have mobility issues, this place might not be for you. I didn't see any gray-haired guests staying there. As for bathroom supplies, they had the 3 usual pump containers in the shower and a hand soap, no frills. 7-eleven right in the building has snacks and a printer, which was handy. The laundry room was crowded at night and had a line out the door, and only takes 100 yen coins (the desk doesn't have them but the drink machine might) or an app, so plan accordingly. Breakfast is piles of individually cellophane-wrapped miniature "breads", one day we had a choice of chocolate or plain "croissants" (not the flaky layered kind with a real chocolate bar, just bready with chocolate paste, but acceptable). The next day were little sugar rolls, or mini matcha or (apple?) croissants, then back to the first day's choices. They are fine, but it gets old fast. Coffee or tea or water for your beverage, but they also have the ubiquitous drinks machine that you see everywhere in Japan. Fast food place across the street is open most of the time, seems to be like the McDonalds of Kyoto (Japanese food) and you can do much better. The hotel location is convenient but not right in the middle of a tourist mecca, so finding good food takes a...

This was one of the worst hotels me and my husband stayed at.

The room itself just looked kinda dirty,there were stains on the carpet (who thought its a good idea to put a white/light grey rug in a hotel room?), there were weird stains on the ceiling(???) and the room just felt so dark,there were no curtains just one roller blind and the window glass was matted,not cozy at all.

Some genius thought its a good idea to put a motion sensor light in the room so every time I had to pee in the middle of the night I would be blinded by light activated by my movement and my husband of course woken up by the light.

But the worst thing about the hotel was the noise. We stayed in many hotels across Japan, this is actually our third time here and our third time in Kyoto, but the noise isolation of the windows in this hotel was the worst (or rather non existent). When the hotel is next to one of the busiest roads in Kyoto, you need to have better noise isolation otherwise you’re going to listen to motorcycles every few minutes ALL NIGHT - and there are MANY of them in Kyoto. I sleep with earplugs and I was still woken up several times per night by the noisy road. I read some of the replies of the hotel to the other bad reviews here, telling people to “just ask for a quiet room” - well we tried that and THAT IS A LIE - the hotel staff just told us “there’s nothing they can do” - so please stop making up lies. I have a feeling there are no quiet rooms in the hotel. Our room was on one of the higher floors and was facing the side street, not the main one and it was still EXTREMELY NOISY. What probably didn’t help was the roller blinds, there should have been some good quality noise dampening heavy curtain instead of flimsy blinds…

The bed itself was awful, the pillows as hard as sleeping on a book.

Would not recommend to anyone, no idea where the good reviews are...