The Vanderbilt, Auberge Collection — Hotel in Newport

I urge you not to host your wedding or event at this venue. I attended the worst wedding of my life, and unfortunately, it was my own, at the Vanderbilt. I am devastated that this is the memory I will have of my wedding day for life.

Coordination is nearly impossible when planning an event at this venue. After paying the initial deposit, you will hear less and less from the coordinator- often three-plus weeks waiting for a response (with multiple follow-up emails). Eventually, you get a response that only addresses every third question or issue being discussed and a promise to follow up with whoever, and then you don't hear for weeks and still rarely get the answer.

Giving explicit instruction, numbering questions and color-coding emails slightly increased the chances of getting the appropriate answers but did not impact professionalism around timeliness. Terrible coordination with their preferred vendors and only one choice of tent vendor and tent type in case of rain. In the tented outdoor space with rain, puddles will collect inside due to uneven patio stones, which further impacts the usability of the space. The day of was full of infuriating and amateur mistakes. To name a few: overbooking in their dining room restaurant, making courses 40-60 minutes apart from one another for my guests, no drinks or water being served to guests after sitting with nothing in front of them for 45 minutes before the cold appetizer course arrived, my wedding cake was cut by staff in the kitchen when I clearly asked the day of coordinator for it to be brought inside so I could see it and me and my husband could cut it with friends and family around to celebrate, as is obviously tradition. My wedding ended up being a ceremony quickly followed by everyone sitting at tables for 3 hours trying to eat. This absorbed all other time and energy of guests to do any other celebrations, dancing, or mingling post dinner. Sadly, most of my wedding photos will be of people sitting at empty tables. These are a few instances; I could go on, but it is truly exhausting and still keeps me up at night.

In the aftermath of this absolutely butchered event, the hotel manager made some efforts to compensate for some of this and was very apologetic. With that said, they continue to expect me to pay for an increased number of guests they are counting incorrectly as they are basing it on the wrong number of chairs they set up. Managerial oversight and diligence are severely lacking, which unfortunately makes it the customers' job to babysit the process post-event as well. In my experience, whatever "the team assures" management of, is blatantly false and simply fabricated. This would be crystal clear if anyone were to look at what the signed contracts outline. Be sure you direct them to do that, as I had to, before being double charged for things there were contractually guaranteed to be included.

Sadly, you don't get wedding re-dos, especially when many family members fly from the other side of the world. Taking some responsibility after the fact (and continuing to fumble the closeout) does nothing to the memory I have to live with. I hope my experience can save someone else from not...

Have been a patron of the hotel and it's various iterations for years. The place is beautiful and love the decor so much that I actually have a chandelier from its previous iteration hanging in my home. We went back after a long hiatus out of state for a casual date night at the bar.

We were offered a menu and so we began with their simple salad and an order of samosas. Would have enjoyed bread and butter to begin the meal but oddly, the restaurant was asking $15 for rolls and butter; as a separate menu item, a bit offputting for a fine dining establishment.

The salad was nonetheless a winner with poached pears, walnuts, a hint of blue cheese, and a light mustard vinaigrette. So fresh. The samosas were snack bites rather than one piece of the usual size and those went over well also.

Then we noticed that another guest was offered a restaurant week menu; we had not been offered one. Restaurant Week menus usually offer a three course set menu and we were interested in exploring all of our options. Unfortunately, we had already had our first course before the alternative menu was finally offered.

Since as it happened, one of us had a first course offered on the set menu and the other had a first course of lesser value than what was being offered on the set menu, we asked our server, Ariel, if we could switch to the restaurant week set menu. She allowed one but adamantly refused the other to the point of being unyielding and surly despite the fact that it was their fault for not offering us the set menu in the first instance. It also made no common sense to put up such a fuss over a starter that was of lesser value anyway under the circumstance. Not a pleasant experience.

We let it go at that point and , rather than leaving, we decided to make the best of an unfortunate situation.

My husband ordered a burger, which was fine. The fries were very hot, which was a plus.

I ordered the Parmesan crusted chicken on a lemon basil sauce. It, or should I say "they" arrived in a bowl. Two large indelicate chicken breasts, side by side, in a bowl. The accompaniments that came with it -- turnips and spinach, amounted to about a a small tablespoon altogether on a corner of the bowl sitting in a greasy mess. The sauce, while tasty, was nothing more than a lemony butter and quite greasy to the palate. The dish was completely unbalanced, not a success andI I just quietly pushed it away.

At this point, the manager Zachary intervened. Lovely fellow and he did the right thing without a fuss after we explained what had transpired throughout our meal. Our only regret was that the server, Ariel, did not think to consult with the manager earlier in the meal, in the moment, to resolve the issues we had encountered. We didn't go out seeking freebies; we went out for a nice meal.

It was ok in the end and the restaurant manager's handling of the situation will invite us back but it could have been a more...

We spent three nights at The Vanderbilt and had a mostly positive experience. The staff was very friendly and accommodating. Many were foreign students preparing to go back to university for the fall. Here are some of our observations.||First, since this is an Historic Hotel, it is not in the modern style. The hotel is dark inside. The dining room is dark, the rooms are dark, the hallways are dark. The walls most everywhere are painted dark green or something comparable. ||The bathroom was small and had only a single pedestal sink with very little counter space. There was a window in the bathroom, but it was right next to the toilet so we had to keep the shade down whenever we were in there, making the bathroom dark.||But it had a great shower. Lots of water pressure and luxury shampoo and body wash. No problem washing the soap out of your hair here.||The room (at least ours) was decorated with heavy furniture and draperies and oriental-style rugs over the (dark) wall-to-wall carpeting. Nothing like a One and Only or similar contemporary hotel. Almost Victorian.||Most troublesome was the air conditioning. Our room had a Packaged Terminal Air Conditioner (PTAC) controlled by a wall thermostat. We much prefer a whole-room system more like we have at home that gradually increases and decreases speeds as needed and which you can barely hear. The PTAC goes off and on according to the temperature set, and is quite noisy. When it is on, it blows cold air and can make the room drafty. Ours, unfortunately, was also squeaking to such a degree that we turned it completely off and used just a sheet since the room got a little warm. Luckily, the nights were cool so it was not too much of a problem. But I expected a better system from a luxury hotel that is part of the Auberge family. I have never encountered such a cooling system in a Ritz, Four Seasons, or comparable luxury brand. ||The food at the hotel was excellent. The view from the rooftop bar is quite impressive. The bartenders mix a mean martini. Their riff on a vesper was my favorite. And breakfast in the garden was a delightful way to start our day.||The location is convenient to Thames Street and the wharves where most of the action is. It is a 10-15 minute drive to the the Cliff Walk and mansions, but if you stay in the area of the mansions (like at the Chanler) there are no restaurants or nightlife around. We found it better to stay in town and then go the mansions for a few hours each day rather than to try to do it the other way around.||We liked The Vanderbilt, but were not blown away. What we do not know, since this was our first trip to Newport, was whether there are any better options within an easy walk of the downtown action. We saw several smaller B&Bs, a Marriott on the water, and the newer Brenton hotel next to the Marriott, but did not explore them in...