Hotel Covington — Hotel in Covington

This is a hot venue so we did have to book in January 2022 for our September 2023 wedding. Cheyenne was on top of all the details and made me feel secure throughout the planning process about the status of our event. Although there were still a lot of pieces we had to coordinate ourselves, Cheyenne was regularly checking in, staying up to date on our plans, and giving helpful recommendations as we went along. Our only two bumps we hit were with the timeline for our day and the ballroom itself. When booking the event our ceremony was booked for 5pm-6pm and our reception was booked for 7pm-12am. When booking I had asked what would happen with the hour in between and was told it would be a cocktail hour so I thought nothing of it. When we were about a month out from the event Cheyenne reached out to let us know that it was a mistake and asked if we wanted to bump our reception up. Since we had already printed and sent invitation showing the end time as midnight we were not wanting to do this. Thankfully, Cheyenne and the event team were willing to work with us to make it right and extended our reception to be 6pm-12am at no additional cost to us. The other bump was that in the year and a half between booking the venue and our event, renovations were done to The Crystal that we were not notified of. I discovered them when we went for our food tasting and we saw the room for the first time since booking. The room is almost fully mirrored and they had applied an antique glass effect to them that I really disliked. There wasn’t anything we could do about this with the event being less than 2 months out and the other reception spaces being booked. This was disappointing, but ultimately on the day of just didn’t matter at all. I only wish we had been given a heads up at the time of renovations so that we could have pivoted plans to a space that was more our aesthetic and vibe. Our ceremony was held on The Lawn at Hotel Covington. I can’t say for certain, but I think there were at least two other weddings happening at the venue on our date. Initially this made me nervous, but you could hardly tell. Our party wasn’t interrupted at all! The Lawn is absolutely stunning and was the perfect backdrop for our ceremony! It was also a fun bonus that my room in the hotel overlooked The Lawn. As I was getting ready throughout the day I could look out and see the florists progress, I could see our guests arrive, and I could watch my husband process down the aisle with his parents. I’ll also note that the hotel is pet friendly which was amazing! We had our dog in our wedding and she was able to stay overnight with us. It was super convenient to have her participate in our ceremony, and then to be able to drop her off up in our hotel room before heading over to the reception! Our reception was in The Crystal Ballroom. It was nice to be right on the first floor and the space comfortably held our ~150 guest wedding with room to spare! I only wish the tables had been more spread out and spread further back towards the entrance of the room. They felt very cramped together which seemed unnecessary given all the space that was open at the end of the room. The price tag looks steep at first glance, it ended up being on par with other more venues we looked at once you factored in caterer, bar services, decor rentals, tables/chairs, and linens. I highly recommend for couples looking to have a smoother planning experience with less moving parts from...

If you find yourself in northern KY, I highly recommend this lovely boutique hotel. My husband and I made an overnight business trip to the area and decided we wanted to try something other than the typical chain hotels. We were disappointed that their restaurant, Coppin’s, was reserved for a private gala so we couldn’t have dinner there. I knew this when we made the reservation a few weeks prior to the trip but I didn’t realize it meant that we wouldn’t be able to use the common areas on the main floor or access the courtyard. I wish that had been explained better when we made the reservation…but I’m still glad we stayed. The staff were incredible and the room was beyond expectations. When we returned from dinner down the road (The Governor’s House Kitchen and Wine Bar) the private gala was in full swing! We noticed everyone was very fabulously dressed. Wish we could have attended!

We talked to the night manager, Matthew, who was very personable and we enjoyed the history lesson he gave us on the hotel. He mentioned that Donna Sayler was part owner. I noticed immediately when we arrived that there were wonderful faux fur throws everywhere, including in the rooms. Donna Salyer is the founder/owner of Fabulous Furs which is my favorite faux fur retailer. That might seems like an unimportant detail to mention about a hotel but the addition of the faux fur throws throughout the lobby and suites added to the ambiance and made it feel like you weren’t in a hotel. Matthew spontaneously decided to discount our room a bit since we couldn’t enjoy the restaurant and other parts of the hotel due to the gala.

We stayed in the Roebling Suite which was huge! I loved the separate sitting area with a couch and throw to curl up with. The bed and pillows were very comfortable. The minibar was fully stocked with more options than is typical plus lots of snacks, many of which were local KY products. My only complaint about the room is that it was right next to the elevator and I could hear everyone using the elevator in the early morning (starting around 6 AM). I mentioned this when checking out and they said they would make a note in my profile for future stays to have a room away from the elevator. All of the staff we interacted with were really incredible it was obvious they have a commitment to wanting every guest to have an enjoyable experience. We had breakfast at Coppin’s and it was delicious! Despite a few minor inconveniences, we are very glad we discovered this hotel and plan on returning next time we are in the area.

UPDATE: I'm removing a star due to the following: I was balancing my check book today (10 days after our stay) and had a charge from the hotel for $32.86 in addition to the separate charge for the overnight stay. I called and spoke to Cassandra with guest services. I assumed this was for in-room snacks/mini bar and I told her the only thing we had was a bag of pretzels. She stated that the charge was for pretzels and that the seal on the "intimacy kit" was broken. I explained we didn't you that kit and wanted the charge removed. She removed the extra charge which I appreciate, but this bothers me. I told her that several reviews mention being charged for items they didn't use. This is an integrity issue for the hotel! I hope they follow up appropriately to address this ongoing problem. If we stay there again, I'll be asking a staff member to check our mini-bar items...

In defense of the hotel, we did arrive to check in on 9/13 when there was a fire emergency. The valet attendant and a few other employees outside the hotel were amazing. They brought us waters while we waited curbside to check in and get all my wedding things inside. Once we finally got in, we had to climb six flights of steps and wait on our things to be delivered to our room. No big deal, we understood the elevators were down and the staff was doing their best.

The next day, I asked for myself and my bridesmaid's breakfast be complimentary just because of the inconvenience we had experienced so far. My rehearsal dinner was the night before at the Madison and my mom could not make it with me upstairs to get ready because she is handicap and could not climb those steps. Plus, no electric. The front desk person, who I believe was named Britney, was actually quite rude and said this was an inconvenience to everyone and she could comp one meal. I was fine with that, so my bridesmaid and I went back upstairs to our room to order. When we called, suddenly front desk attendant can only comp an omelet. I agree, there were other people inconvenienced. The hotel did a great job of not trying to make anything right for anyone. Not asking for a free stay, but a couple small things like that would have been appreciated. I was also put off because many of my guests missed the bridal rate because I was not given a call as I was promised a month ahead of time so I can let them know they needed to book their hotel if they wanted the rate. I had to explain to our sales person at the time that we understood was in contract, but having planned a large wedding, we had to look at a lot of contracts in the past year. The hotel was actually the first we booked about a yesr prior. At this point, I was already regretting utilizing this hotel for our big day about a week before we even arrived due to this. Flash forward to the morning of the wedding. We had physically stopped in the hotel about two months prior to the big day and confirmed that all of the liquor and extra snack items be taken out of our room so that we weren't charged. Once Again, Britney at the front desk said that was never noted in the file. They did finally take it out of the room, but not without an attitude from her.

Overall, it was probably the most stressful and disappointing vendor we had hired for our wedding. While the hotel their best in some respect, I do not believe they were very customer service focused once we got closer to the wedding and of course, the day of. We do not blame the emergency situation and loss of power on them. However, I don't think they recovered from that very well.

What's very upsetting is my mother works for a very large international company and brought Hotel Covington someone's salary worth of business earlier this year. She was also incredibly disappointed by our personal experience with the hotel and will likely not be recommending to her...