Pennyweight Hotel Boston, Curio Collection by Hilton — Hotel in Boston

Unfortunately unbeknownst to us our nightmare began when we checked in. I (the girlfriend, posting under my boyfriend's account) will try to explain what happened in the sequence of events. We used the valet, which was $65 a night to park our car as there was no street parking option - fine, it is what it is. However, with all our stuff, we did not realize we left my laptop in the car.

When we got to the room we saw we were given the room 611 for December 26th-27th, which faced an alley with no view, except into other people's hotel rooms. Fine, we were only there for a night, no big deal. However, the next morning we were awoken at 7am on the dot with INCREDIBLY loud banging which sounded like a hammer hitting a metal pipe from outside our window. It was so loud that if you put your hand on the windowsill you could feel it shaking. We went to call down to the front desk to see if we were missing something about construction because no one mentioned any work being done to the building. To our surprise, there was no phone in the room, so at 7am my boyfriend and I went down to the front desk to ask if there was construction going on. We were greeted by the person at the front desk who said "Oh yeah, the city is doing construction." I said to him that if we were staying more than one night we would have been asked to be moved to another room. He responded by saying that you can hear it throughout the hotel, which was inaccurate because as soon as we even stepped into the hallway, we couldn't hear anything at all. I then asked him if they knew about the construction, why were we not informed about it during check in, and he proceeded to tell us that they knew it was happening but don't know when and what time it will start and end. He did not offer any sort of apology, and was rude throughout the interaction. We did not ask for any compensation, we wanted information.

Not convinced and slightly miffed about the response we got, my boyfriend looked up the city of Boston's permit for this construction and found that they were granted it in October of this year. While we aren't sure when they actually started construction, we think it would be safe to assume based on the progress of the massive jackhammer we saw that it was at least a handful of weeks. This means that the hotel actively chose NOT to inform us of this incredibly disturbing construction and then chose to put us in a room almost directly next to it!!!

We ended up checking out early at 8am, and we were so caught up with the annoyance of the banging and wanting to just get out of there, I did not realize my laptop was missing from the car!!! When my boyfriend and I got to our next destination, we were emptying the car, and laying right there was my laptop bag EMPTY. In it was supposed to be my MacBook Pro and charger, along with my phone charger. ALL OF IT WAS GONE.

I called the hotel and they said the manager wasn't going to be in until Monday and I should expect a call from a manager then, and if I don't get a call to call back - which I find to be highly unacceptable to wait 3 days for a manager to maybe or maybe not call me.

As of right now, we got the $25 resort fee refunded - another thing that we were not told about during the time of our booking (using booking.com) because of the banging. This occurred when we went to check out, when the guy at the front desk we spoke to before and seemed to be in a better mood, checked us out.

I will be waiting for the call from the manager on Monday, and will update this review then.

In the meantime i recommend NO ONE to stay here. In addition to everything posted above, this hotel did not provide a hair dryer in the room, only decaf coffee in the room, no lotion, and no phone in the room either. It was overall a very stressful experience which cost us $230 + $1,750 the cost of a new MacBook for the "privilege" of staying in a hotel that lacked the usual Hilton hospitality we are used to.

We have posted pictures of the construction below along with the video + sound from INSIDE OUR HOTEL ROOM. See...

The Onyx Hotel is located between Boston's West End and North End, close to Boston's TD Garden (home of the Boston Celtics and Boston Bruins) plus lots of sports bars and pubs. It's also an easy walk to Boston's Freedom Trail (Old North Church, Paul Revere's house, Bunker Hill, etc) and Faneuil Hall (great food and over 100 of the finest shops).

When our family of 4 (2 adults & 2 children - 6 & 11) arrived, we were greeted by 2 great valets/bellhops that help us get our luggage out of our car and into the lobby, while our car was whisked away to an unknown location. Since we arrived during their "evening wine reception", the lobby was packed with hotel guests consuming their free glass of wine. This made getting all of us and our luggage to the front desk and then to our room a definite challenge. Part of the reason for the lack of lobby space is because of the 6-8 table cafe/bistro/restaurant that consumes of the bottom floor.

We then finally made it to our 2 double-beds room... an incredibly small 2 double-beds room. With a single 2 foot wide window. Looking at a lower rooftop with AC units. And with almost no place to set most of our luggage, besides the floor. Just last week we stayed downtown in another major east coast city (also a 4-star hotel and for the same price), had a room that was literally twice (possibly 3x) the size and had significant windows overlooking the city's skyline.

Then, thanks to the locked minibar/refrigerator, there is no usable refrigerator. And no microwave. I guess they expect you to order from their rather overpriced (in my opinion) room service menu. For example, to me, $4 for a glass of milk or $9 for a basket of fries is just too much.

Next comes the room decor. Very art deco, very dark and heavy. And consuming most of the room's space. Plus the desk truly appears to have had it's finish touched up with a permanent marker.

Next was the bathroom. Fairly spacious but which had received a rather obvious superficial make-over. For example, some fixtures were slightly rusty (due to no exhaust fan) and parts of the poorly "redone" shower grout had come off; exposing the discolored original "white" grout underneath. The sink also had a major discolored "spider" crack and had no hot water (literally, even after running full hot for 5+ minutes). Only by running the water in the bathtub for 2-3 minutes at full hot could I actually get hot water from the sink. Unfortunately, the sink won't hold water (the drain stop wasn't working) so I had to just run the hot water while I shaved (wasting more water than necessary).

The room did have AC, surprisingly necessary despite low 60's outside, high winds and rain, but was way too loud to let run all night.

Then, when I found the next morning that we needed a couple more things from our car, I went asking about my car at the front desk. Only to be told that it was in a "private parking garage" and that I could not go to my car. He then suggested that I just tell him what I wanted from my car and he'd have a valet go look through my car for it, for me. "Excuse me??!?" Fortunately, one of yesterday's valet/bellhops grabbed me and we trooped off (in the rain) towards the massive Haymarket Station public parking garage a couple blocks away, home of the local Enterprise Rent-a-Car.

Lastly, they do offer WiFi ($10 per visit) but free if you sign up for their "Kimpton InTouch" rewards program. Sadly, the WiFi dropped repeatedly (about 2 dozen times) during just my 45 minutes to write this review.

Can I recommend the Onyx Hotel? Sure. If you're a single person or youngish couple looking for a boutique hotel towards the grittier (i.e. "louder") end of Boston's nightlife. If you're older or have underage children with you, I'd recommend looking elsewhere.

Will I be back? No. Possibly not even to another different...

Let’s start with the service; I am a Diamond Level at Hilton. My profile states to not put me near an Elevator. When I got off the elevator on my floor I realized my room was butted up against the elevator. Clearly no one bothered to look at my profile. I went down to the desk, the person seemed to not care one way or the other and just put me in another room further away from the elevator. Got to that room, and noticed that the shower door was opened into the small bathroom. It would not close! So back down to the desk again. Again the desk person did not care at all that this was now going to be my third room. He puts me in another room. About the rooms. They were renovated. Whomever did the renovation clearly has no concept of convenience. They built a fake fireplace where a desk would be. So no desk. They have a corner chair that is very uncomfortable to sit in with a tiny side table that barely fit a computer on it. The room I was in had no phone. Carrying on now, A bit later the lights went out in the room. I used my cell phone to call downstairs to have someone come up to see what was going on. Also no plugs were now working so my computer and cell phone was not charging. After needing to make another call downstairs they finally sent up engineering. They first told me it’s the hair dryer that was plugged in but not on causing the problem. He agreed with me that lots of people complained about the lack of desk. The lights were back on. Then a half an hour later the lights went out again. And again I needed to call twice before the engineer came back up. He said they are going to move me to yet another and my 4th room. That room seemed ok. No desk but at least it had a phone in the room. Later that day I went to the bathroom and found out the toilet did not flush. I was leaving and asked the front desk to fix the toilet.

The engineer did say they would comp my first night. While that was nice for my company it did absolutely nothing for me!

Then fast forward to the last day my business associate whom I was traveling with who also stayed at the hotel, had a car that we had originally decided to valet because there was nothing else you can really do with it.Valet was $65 per day.

They later tell us that valet does not come in. Until 7am. Both mornings we had meetings and needed to leave at 7:00. On the last day we needed to get to the airport. We told the valet person the night before we needed to leave no later then 7am. He said no problem. Next morning at 7am he was not there. By 7:05 I needed to take an Uber because my flight was leaving before my associate was. I come to find out by 7:15 the valet was still not there. The desk person said that they would drive him over to their garage which was several blocks away to get his car.

When they got there they said you can get out here and go inside the garage. My associate said absolutely not. You are going to drive me inside and help me find my car.

One other note: on the website it shows a beautifully decorated lobby with a full bar. That is a misrepresentation of what the lobby looks like. First it’s very dumpy and old looking. The bar was not up and running. Nothing was there other than the counter. There were a few sofas that were worn and old and that is it! The website pictures look nothing like the reality of this hotel. All in all this was a disaster!!! I had no one call me as a Diamond member to say they were sorry for all the mess and inconvenience. This is the worst experience I have had at a Hilton. And Particularly at a...